East Carolina has been on the road for three games over the last four weeks. Trips to Virginia Tech, North Carolina and Southern Miss have allowed Coach Ruffin McNeill's first-year team to gain some experience and mature against some quality opposition.

The Pirates are still looking to play 60 minutes but one element of good news is that ECU returns home with the same status in the sense of the Conference USA race that it left Greenville with following a 49-27 win over Memphis.

The Pirates are still unbeaten in C-USA.

ECU erased a 20-0 deficit at the outset of last week's battle at Southern Miss to come back for a 44-43 win that left the Pirates at 3-0 in league play.

ECU's bid to defend its two-time C-USA championship will be on hold this week as in-state rival N.C. State comes to Greenville for the third time. It's a noon kickoff at Dowdy-Ficklen Stadium. The Wolfpack leads the series, 16-10. ECU is 1-1 in Greenville and 2-1 at neutral sites. The Pack has won 14 of 21 games in Raleigh.

"You have no idea how happy we are to be playing at the Fick," said senior defensive lineman Josh Smith at the conclusion of practice on Wednesday.

"It feels good to be back home," said ECU quarterback Dominique Davis. "It's been about a month we've been on the road. It's going to be exciting to have 50,000 fans behind us cheering us on."

The road has been long with many a winding turn for the Pirates. Playing 60 minutes is still a team goal. ECU played well into the second half before Virginia Tech and North Carolina pulled away. The Pirates seemed to take the first quarter off in Hattiesburg last week before staging a comeback for the ages at the Rock.

Smith said the Pirates have learned some lessons in their travels.

"We stressed playing for 60 minutes going into the Southern Miss game," Smith said. "We wanted to play Pirate football for four quarters. We'd play it for a half and part of the third quarter. It was one of those things when you figure out if you play together — 11 guys are clicking on both sides of the ball and on special teams — these are things you can accomplish. I was really happy with the way we pulled through that adversity (at Southern Miss) and turned it into a positive.

"It gets kind of frustrating but I think we finally figured out by the end of the game what it's like to feed off each other and to stay positive, not get down on ourselves because the things we can accomplish in a short amount of time with this offense we have to realize. I told the guys on defense, 'If we can just get the ball back for the offense, it won't take 'em but two or three minutes to score a touchdown.' There are 60 minutes in the game. Just think how many points are possible if we just get the offense the ball as many times as possible. That's what we're striving to do on defense.

"The offense did well in the second half doing that."

Davis echoed the complete effort line of thought.

"What we've learned is that you've got to play a whole game and just trust each other — don't bring each other down," Davis said. "If we get together and trust each other, we will be fine. That's what happened against Tulsa and Southern Miss."

Pack presents challenges

The Wolfpack (5-1) is led by quarterback Russell Wilson, who ranks fifth nationally in total offense with 327.5 yards per game.

"We've got to contain Russell Wilson," Smith said. "He's a great quarterback. He's a lot like Tyrod Taylor (Virginia Tech). He's shorter, however, so if we can keep him in the pocket and not let him get too far out where he can start making reads and receivers start breaking off routes then I think it will be hard for him to make completions back there.

"The shortest guy on the O-Line is the center and he's 6-3. You get hands up in the air and all that kind of stuff, you can cause some problems. The biggest thing is going to be playing assignment football and make sure we keep him contained."

The Pirates (3-2) managed to overcome a minus-4 turnover deficit at Southern Miss, another rather incredible aspect of that victory.

"We've got to cut down on the few mistakes we have," Davis said. "We've got to cut down on penalties, just trust each other, make the routine plays like Coach Ruff tells us every day and we should be fine."

No attraction to Amato

Smith played football for coach Nelson Smith, a former ECU offensive lineman in the Pat Dye era, at Garner High near N.C. State.

"It was a school I was interested in and I would have loved to have played at but I didn't too much care for (former Wolfpack coach) Chuck Amato," Smith said. "I didn't ever really pay too much attention to him. One time when he came to my high school, he had on all red — red shoes and his sunglasses and tie. That was a real problem for me. That wasn't somebody I really wanted to play for.

"My dad went to school (at State) and it's something that would have been nice to do but it just wasn't the place for me. I don't regret not going there."

Amato, incidentally, has responded well to treatment for neck and throat cancer and hopes to return to coaching in some capacity in the 2011 season.

Smith played at Western Carolina in 2006 before transferring to ECU and playing on the defensive front in 2008.

"I think (Garner coach Smith) was actually shocked when I committed to (ECU), and I came back to (Garner) and told him," Josh Smith said. "We hadn't really talked about it other than him telling me about the campus. I didn't know how much influence he had on the program here — playing with Coach Ruff and playing with some of the guys I've come to know now.

"He didn't try to influence me but he was certainly happy when I chose to come here."

Expecting an electric atmosphere

The N.C. State game has been sold out for weeks and the 50,000-seat stadium should be filled to overflowing.

"It's going to be intense," Smith said. "I'm excited to play in front of these fans. Like I told everybody, I'm glad they ripped the bleachers out of the student section because there's no telling what will be going on.

"I think we realized at the Southern Miss game that we can be a great team if we play together. Everyone plays for each other and plays for a bigger cause than yourself. I think that's the biggest thing we're taking from the Southern Miss game but the rivalry is going to be intense this weekend."

Davis played on the high school level in Florida. He performed briefly at Boston College before playing at Fort Scott Community College in Kansas last season. He's been learning about the rivalry with the Wolfpack.

"I really didn't know this game had so much importance to everybody around here so we're going to try to win it for the fans," Davis said. "Of course, the Southern Miss game gave us some confidence and we're going to try to keep it going throughout the season. We want to keep winning games and go forward to the conference championship."