NC State football seeks Duke’s Mayo Bowl win over Maryland, tries to ‘go out the right way’

N.C. State’s Wolfpack went into the 2022 football season determined to be playing in Charlotte in December — on the first weekend of the month, not the last.

There was no ACC Championship game appearance for the Wolfpack in Charlotte this season. Losses at Clemson and then at Syracuse ended the Pack’s hopes of winning the Atlantic Division and getting to the conference’s Dec. 3 title game.

But the Wolfpack has a game Friday at Bank of America Stadium that it wants to win, too. Beat Maryland in the Duke’s Mayo Bowl, and it can finish a most challenging season 9-4, and on an uptick, something to build on as it prepares for 2023.

“We pride ourselves on finishing the job and we want to go out the right way,” senior linebacker Isaiah Moore said Thursday.

As for the Wolfpack’s quarterback against the Terrapins (7-5), NCSU coach Dave Doeren would not commit to a starter during a news conference at the Charlotte Convention Center.

Photos: NC State vs Maryland in the Mayo Bowl

“Why would I do that?” Doeren said.

MJ Morris and Ben Finley should both play in the bowl game. Morris became the first true freshman to start at QB for the Pack since Philip Rivers in 2000, and Finley gained almost folk-hero status among Wolfpack fans with his play in the 30-27 double-overtime thriller and win against North Carolina to end the regular season.

Morris has not played since the Boston College game on Nov. 12, when he suffered a lower-body injury but stayed in the game as the Pack took a 21-20 loss at Carter-Finley Stadium.

While Morris was medically cleared and back when the bowl practices began, Doeren said he did not expect any of the other players injured late in the season to play against Maryland, including running back Demie Sumo-Karngbaye, who was hampered by a foot injury.

“It will be pretty much who we finished the year with,” Doeren said Thursday. “But everybody is feeling better, you know. The fact that Drake Thomas and all these guys who have played almost all of our reps this year got 20 days off over the last 32 days makes their bodies feel better.

“We’ll play fast.”

In looking at the Terps, it’s a guessing game, Doeren said.

“There’s rumors of all these opt-outs, so there will be a little bit of adjusting going on,” he said.

The Pack coaches do know quarterback Taulia Tagovailoa will be the Maryland starter. The 5-11, 200-pound redshirt junior, a consummate dual threat, was a second-team All-Big Ten selection in 2022.

Against Ohio State, Tagovailoa was 26-of-36 passing for 293 yards and two touchdowns while rushing for a third TD . The Terrapins took a 43-30 loss that was closer than the final score — the Buckeyes scored 10 points in the last 42 seconds.

“He’s a great competitor and great play-maker,” Wolfpack linebacker Drake Thomas said Thursday.

Maryland coach Mike Locksley said the Terrapins faced very few defensive looks in the Big Ten similar to the Pack’s 3-3-5 stack defense, one of the ACC’s best. It can cause consternation and confusion for quarterbacks as the Pack switches up blitzes and secondary coverages.

“If they’ve never seen it before it could create some issues,” Thomas said. “But since they don’t go against 3-man fronts in the Big Ten, we haven’t seen any film on how they block it or scheme it, either. It could be an advantage to both teams.”

Having Thomas in the lineup will be an advantage for the Pack. The junior, the Pack’s leading tackler this season, recently announced he would enter the 2023 NFL draft and give up his final year of college eligibility.

He could have opted out of the bowl. No one would have blamed him.

“I’ve never had any intentions but to play in the game,” Thomas said Thursday.

Bowl organizers say the Bank of America crowd is expected to be about 36,000 to 38,000, with a starting-time temperature forecast to be about 60 degrees.

Doeren and the Pack players say they have had their fun during bowl week, including the Racing Experience on Tuesday at Charlotte Motor Speedway.

Doeren said he and his sons took turns in hopping in a NASCAR racer for a few spins around the track.

“It was fun,” he said. “I had perma-grin.”

The Wolfpack players said the top speeds might have been about 175 mph, and that the banks of the speedway were a lot steeper than they expected.

“It was pretty intense,” Thomas said. “We were rolling.”

How fast?

“I didn’t look at speedometer,” he said, smiling.