The Independent Weekly’s commentary on local sports
At 4-2 overall and still needing to finish .500 in its last six games to attend some random tire bowl, the North Carolina football team trots home to have coach Butch Davis sign the dotted line.
Is it refrigerator worthy or will there be no more Twinkies in their lunch boxes? The report card for year three of the Davis experiment follows after the jump.
East Carolina quarterback Patrick Pinkney in a 31-17 loss to UNC. (Photo by Rob Rowe)
KENAN STADIUM/ CHAPEL HILL—Before kickoff the Pirates had several forces in motion that favored them to upset the No. 24-ranked Tar Heels.
ECU had won its last three games against nationally ranked teams. UNC entered the game with two key injuries on the offensive line, and Pirates quarterback Patrick Pinkney torched the Carolina secondary in 2007.
Not to mention seemingly all my ex-girlfriends attended ECU, so naturally I would be due several distasteful comments with a Carolina loss.
Yet 60 minutes later with the scoreboard showing 31-17 Carolina, one thing was clear. The lone force the Pirates couldn’t contend with was Carolina’s defense, which allowed a meager 55 rushing yards — building off stingy performances against The Citadel and UConn.
Here’s a stat for you: UNC is allowing only 1.8 yards per carry so far this season.
“We want to go out there and be the best defense each and every Saturday,” UNC defensive tackle Marvin Austin said after the game.
One of UNC’s most experienced wide receivers — sophomore Dwight Jones — will undergo arthroscopic surgery on his knee Friday and miss the season opener against The Citadel, UNC spokesman Kevin Best said in an e-mail.
Jones missed practice Wednesday because of pain, and a determination of how long he’ll be out will be made after the surgery.
After losing Hakeem Nicks, Brandon Tate and Brooks Foster to the NFL, Carolina is counting on Jones and Greg Little, the other starting wideout, to carry a young receiving corps.
Joshua Adams, a 6-foot-4 freshman, is listed behind Jones on the depth chart. Adams was impressive in preseason practice, but the loss of Jones for any extended period of time will burden UNC’s offense.
UNC started preseason practice Friday, officially beginning the 2009-10 season — the third season under head coach Butch Davis.
Carolina ended last season with an 8-4 record and finished third overall in the Coastal Division with a .500 record in league play. The Tar Heels enter the season ranked No. 20 in the USA Today Coaches’ Poll, despite many holes in the offense, a tough schedule and an improved ACC.
Here are a few questions leading up to the first game Sept. 5 against the Citadel.
Will the receivers step up? Frankly, the Tar Heels are probably tired of hearing it, but the loss of one of the nations’ top receiving corps from last season — which included Brooks Foster, Hakeem Nicks and Brandon Tate — leaves the talent level severely depleted. Greg Little is the only player returning with more than 10 receptions. Little and a slew of freshman and underclassman will have to take the pressure off the rushing game if UNC hopes to move the ball on offense.
At least not in the most important statistic: wins.
Don’t get me wrong. UNC football coach Butch Davis has the gears in motion for churning out competitive ACC teams for years to come, but with the current pieces in place, the Tar Heels’ season will be eerily familiar to last season.
Hakeem Nicks
On a sour day for Tar Heel fans across the state after Roy Williams’ squad dropped a thriller to Boston College Sunday, junior wideout Hakeem Nicks announced he will declare for the 2009 NFL draft after pulling in 217 yards receiving in the Meineke Car Care Bowl.
Nicks is leaving UNC already holding 14 school records including yards in a season (1222) and touchdowns in a season (12).
“Carolina has been a special place for me,” said Nicks. “I want to thank my teammates, the coaching staff and the Tar Heel fans for supporting me during my three years in Chapel Hill.”
The departure of Nicks and the graduation of Brooks Foster and Brandon Tate leaves Carolina’s receiving corps severely depleted.
Here’s a video of one of Nicks’ greatest catches of his career.
T.J. Yates, who missed six weeks with a broken ankle, combined for six total touchdowns. Yates completed a career high five touchdown passes and ran for a score as well.
Brooks Foster caught four passes for 106 yards and had the biggest play of the day, a 57-yard touchdown pass from Yates to break the game open.
As a “sports blogger,” I’m not really sure what ethical parameters are supposed to guide me. I guess if a UNC athletic department official offered me $20 to say that Boston College’s cheerleaders smell like bourbon, or that I heard that Randy Shannon huffs amyl nitrite and drinks PBR, I wouldn’t do it. I might take the money, but I’d never write anything I knew to be false.
I am, however, fairly certain that I don’t have to pretend to the same kind of impartiality that news reporters fake. I’m free to be a fan.
Hakeem Nicks
At first, this didn’t matter much. I like football, I live in North Carolina, I knew I’d enjoy covering the ‘Heels, but I didn’t care much whether they won or lost. To be honest, I expected them to be terrible, but I thought that, in some ways, it might be more interesting to cover a bad team than a good one.
But now I’m a convert. These guys don’t have the most high-profile players, a media-anointed coach, or the most historic program. They play for a school whose academic standards are high enough to make recruiting tricky. They’re not in, or near, a major urban center likely to attract high profile players. They lost starting QB TJ Yates early in the season, and their best offensive player, future NFL starter Brandon Tate, two weeks ago. Neither will return. Coming into Saturday’s game, they had two in-conference losses, one to Virginia Tech when Yates went down, and the other to erratic Virginia in their first game without Tate.
But this has been a strange and exciting season for North Carolina under Coach Butch Davis, an old hand brought in to raise the program’s reputation. Strange because they keep winning games despite allowing opponents to beat them in total yards and time of possession, and exciting because they make big plays, offensively (usually big passes to Hakeem Nicks or Tate), defensively (the team is intercepting the ball at a record-setting pace), and on special teams (specifically punt blocks).
Last week, against see-saw Virginia, they finally outgained an opponent - and lost.
Saturday, North Carolina faced another ACC foe, 5-1 Boston College. BC has an ace QB, Chris Crane, and is known for scoring in bunches. Having lost two in-conference games, UNC had to win to keep their bowl hopes alive.
However, UNC lost their first Tate-less contest last week, and I was pretty skeptical that they could keep pulling rabbits out of a hat every game. Continue reading »
Alright, this’ll have to be quick, mainly because I wasn’t able to go to the game, and a TiVo malfunction precluded me from watching the whole thing. In fact, I think I’ll supplement this summary with a Roy Williams anecdote, seeing as how basketball season is within sniffing distance.
Butch Davis
The Tar Heels beat storied Notre Dame to continue their surprising season Saturday. OK, they didn’t exactly triumph over the Notre Dame of yore, but Charlie Weis’ team, after suffering through a hellish ‘07, was 4-1 coming into Saturday’s game, and looks to be on the up. So, another win over a name team for the Heels, bringing their record to 5-1 and further cementing the impression that, in the long-term, Coach Butch Davis will make North Carolina a contender in the ACC, and in the short-term, North Carolina could be looking at some interesting bowl scenarios after the regular season.
What’s most interesting about the Notre Dame game is how UNC won. Much like last week’s win over (previously) undefeated UConn, a glance at the stats would lead a casual observer to believe that UNC probably lost the game. But the Heels have developed an expertise in turning opponents’ mistakes into points—in this case capitalizing on turnovers by talented, precocious Notre Dame QB Jimmy Clausen.
So, the defense has been good at forcing mistakes (already exceeding their interception total for last season) and the offense has been able to score when it counts. This is promising, and it has to say something about defensive savvy and overall endurance. But the fact that UNC has had to scrap for almost every win (yesterday’s game against Notre Dame was decided in the final seconds, as was the win against Miami), and that they tend to let opponents score between interceptions and fumbles, is troubling. They’re going to have to play better to beat really good teams, but they seem to be closer to that level than they’ve been in years. And they’ve certainly improved their performance in close games over last year’s 4-8 squad, which lost four games by four points or less.
Cam Sexton
The other high point for UNC in Saturday’s game: QB Cam Sexton, filling in for injured starter TJ Yates, continues to get the ball to the team’s best offensive assets, receivers Brandon Tate, Hakeem Nicks and Brooks Foster. Against Notre Dame, Sexton passed for 201 yards and ran for a 4-yard TD early in the fourth quarter. Nicks had nine receptions for 141 yards. Tate, however, went out in the first quarter with an injury sustained while returning a punt. He walked off the field under his own power, but there’s no word on the prognosis yet.
Next up, a trip to Charlottesville for the even-steven Cavaliers (3-3, 1-1). This is the club that Duke throttled earlier this fall. This is also the club that knocked off East Carolina yesterday, 35-20.
_______________________
So, a couple weeks ago, I spent all of five minutes with UNC basketball coach Roy Williams at a UNC football game.
Well, we waited for an elevator, rode on the elevator, and walked down a hallway together. I didn’t even try to talk to the guy. First of all, what’s the point? But even if I’d wanted to offer thanks and praises, or ask him to lay hands on me, I would have had to find an opening, because this guy was swarmed. I felt uncomfortable just watching. Everyone wanted a piece, and Roy just smiled and took it as everyone within a 20-foot range yelled greetings and, hilariously, basketball advice.
The strangest thing was how touchy-feely people were with Roy. He was accosted on the elevator by an alum, and this guy (Carolina blue sweater vest, pressed khakis, Titleist visor) stood inches from Roy’s face, talking about how he was sure he and Roy had some friends in common and wouldn’t it be great to go out to dinner sometime, and by the way he had no doubt, none whatsoever, that a national championship was in store for Roy’s boys this year. … And on he went.
When the elevator door opened for his floor, he didn’t just shake Roy’s hand, like many of the others I’d seen (a pattern which would repeat three times during a short walk from the elevator to the box where Roy was watching the game, culminating with a guy who I’m pretty was a janitor giving Roy a hearty handshake and mini-hug).
This good old boy patted Roy’s belly. Patted his belly! How is that an acceptable salutation?
Granted, as UNC coach, Roy is public property to some degree, and he also doesn’t have the forbidding mien of a Nick Saban. He looks like a nice guy, often has a grin on his face. … But how that translates into a license to pat his belly. … Roy just took it all with a happy smile. Maybe he’s been that way ever since Ty Hansbrough decided to play another year, or maybe he gulps down a handful of Xanax before facing the good burghers of Chapel Hill in public situations. All I know is that I had an almost irresistible urge to ruffle his hair and kiss him, softly, on each cheek, before we parted ways.
One of the interesting things about sports is the unquantifiable nature of much of it. No matter how much sportswriters and analysts try to fit the entirety of a game into a box score, there are always things that can’t be measured. These things are often very important: They can comprise the “why” of winning and losing.
For instance, when North Carolina’s defense went limp in the second half of an important game against conference rivals Virginia Tech Saturday, there was no easily discernible reason behind it.
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