Syracuse (4-5, 2-3 Atlantic Coast) returns home to the Carrier Dome to take on North Carolina State (4-5, 1-4) at 12:30 p.m. on Saturday with both teams making the final push for bowl eligibility.

Orange head coach Dino Babers spoke on the Atlantic Coast Conference’s coaches teleconference on Wednesday. Here are three things he talked about.

Dungey, Mahoney and Wilson

At Babers’ press conference Monday, the SU head coach declined to elaborate on how practice reps would be divvied up between Eric Dungey, Zack Mahoney and Austin Wilson. Babers stayed with the same line of thinking, saying again that it would give North Carolina State a competitive advantage.

The coach did, however, say that Dungey was undergoing testing Monday and reiterated that Wednesday. The head coach did not elaborate on what type of testing Dungey was going through Monday or Wednesday. Babers said SU is waiting for Dungey’s tests to come back to “clear up what our opportunities with or without (Dungey) are going to be.” Receiver Amba Etta-Tawo and linebacker Zaire Franklin both said Dungey practiced on Tuesday when players spoke with the media.

“I really didn’t say what the testing was for because I think there’s some legal rights that I’ve got to make sure I don’t surrender in Eric’s situation,” Babers said. “He’s still under testing. We’ll make a release with the ACC Thursday night.”

The big picture

Sitting at 4-5 and 2-3 in the ACC, Babers was asked whether rebuilding Syracuse has been harder or easier than he thought when the head coach took the job. Babers referred back to two issues as areas he still felt need to be cleared with the program: depth and scholarship numbers. The SU head coach feels two or three recruiting classes should help SU’s depth and get it to where it needs to be.

“If you’re going build it the right way,” Babers said, “you’re going to have to tear down the foundation, get right to the bottom and start building it up.”

Babers referred back to a story from his childhood saying his father used to make him cut the grass with a push lawnmower and he knew he just had to cut the grass before he could come back into the house.

“I’m starting to cut this grass,” Babers said, “the grass at Syracuse’s University and I’m not going to stop until we’re done.”

In past weeks, he’s added that SU would need to recruit a full starting team for the Class of 2016.

The position he left Bowling Green in

As Babers has tried to rebuild Syracuse, the program he left behind has struggled mightily. Bowling Green is 1-8 this season with its only win coming over FCS squad North Dakota. Last season, Bowling Green finished 10-4 and won the Mid-American Conference title.

BGSU lost starting quarterback Matt Johnson, starting wide receivers Roger Lewis and Gehrig Dieter and starting running back Travis Greene after last season. The program hired former Texas Tech coach Mike Jinks to run the “Air Raid” offense, a pass-happy style of spread offense. This season, BGSU has lost two games by more than 60 points.

“The biggest thing you have to remember is in any transition,” Babers said, ” you’re changing terminology, you’re changing a style of offense, you’re changing a style of defense, different players coming in and going out, in the transition you may lose people academically. … There’s a lot of reasons why things happen.

“I felt like we were in good shape, I’m sure (former SU head coach Scott Shafer) felt like he was in fantastic shape, and as most coaches do when they leave a program, they think they leave it better than they find it. But that’s not for me to judge, you guys can decide that stuff.”

Published on November 9, 2016 at 12:25 pm

Contact Chris: cjlibona@syr.edu | @ChrisLibonati