UNC Tar Heels Football Team Makes Late Comeback to Hold Off Duke for the Victory

by Derrick Isaiah Clyburn

The North Carolina football team faced off against their in-state rival Duke on Saturday night as they look to remain in first place in the ACC Coastal Division. It was a close game to start with both offenses scoring on their first offensive drives. UNC had early success in passing, while Duke succeeded in their rushing game. Neither offense had trouble marching down the field as the game was 10-7 early in the first quarter with the Heels leading.

Duke went on another long drive of their own deep in the North Carolina territory before the Tar Heels got a huge 4th down stop near the goal line. However, Duke’s defense would get a stop of their own, take the lead on the next drive and score 14 unanswered points. Duke led 21-10 with just over a minute left in the second quarter, but the Heels would respond with a touchdown drive to cut the lead to 4 going into halftime.

North Carolina’s rushing defense was very poor as they allowed more rushing yards in the first half than they allowed in the last two games combined. UNC even allowed Duke quarterback Riley Leonard to have his career high in rushing with 109 yards.

In the second half, North Carolina came out ready to play. The Carolina defense came out and got two straight stops, completely shutting down the running game that gave them so many problems in the first half. This was followed by the UNC offense scoring touchdowns on their first two drives after halftime to help give the Tar Heels a 10-point lead. With 2 minutes and 26 left in the third quarter, the Tar Heels got a huge stop on fourth down to give the Tar Heels the ball back in field goal range. At this point in the game, UNC had all the momentum as it felt like they had total control of the game.

However, instead of capitalizing on the great field position, the Heels went 3 and out and missed the field goal. Arguably the biggest shift in the game came after the Tar Heels called a flea flicker play on 2nd down and then on the very next play Duke got a sack. That drive resulted in no points and Duke would go down and score a touchdown to cut the lead back to 3.

Instead of North Carolina being up 13 points, they were now only up 3 and were in a dogfight for the remainder of the game. The Heels punted on their next offensive drive and Duke would go down to score another touchdown to give them a 35-31 lead. On the very next drive, the Tar Heels fumbled and gave Duke the ball back. With just over seven minutes left in the game, the pressure was now on the Tar Heels’ defense to make a play and give the Heels’ offense one last chance to win the game. Duke would drive down the field and get in field goal range but missed the field goal.

The Tar Heels got the ball back with 2 minutes left in the game with one last shot to take the lead and extend their winning streak against Duke. Drake Maye would lead the team down the field and throw a touchdown pass to Antoine Greene to give the Heels a 38-35 lead with 16 seconds left in the game. On the very next drive, Duke did not give up as they still tried to get in field goal range. Duke would indeed get just past the 50-yard line before Will Hardy forced an interception to seal the game for the Tar Heels.

The Tar Heels remain unbeaten in the Coastal division and are still in first place in the division as they move to 6-1 on the season.

UNC Game Stats

UNC Total Offense– 536 yards

Rushing 156 Passing 380

UNC Passing: Drake Maye 28-38-380 yards 3TDs

UNC Rushing: Drake Maye 18-70 yards, Caleb Hood 10-48 yards, Elijah Green 3-24 yards 2TDs

UNC Receiving: Josh Downs 9-12 yards, Antoine Green 4-112 yards 1TD, Caleb Hood 5-32 yards 1TD, Kamari Morales 1-10 yards 1TD

Duke Total Offense– 540 yards

Duke Passing: Riley Leonard 20-31-245 yards 1TD 1INT

Duke Rushing: Riley Leonard 14-130 yards 1TD, Jordan Waters 15-91 yards 2TDs, Jacquez Moore 7-36 yards 1TD

Duke Receiving: Jalon Calhoun 6-55 yards, Sahmir Hagans 2-31 yards 1TD

UNC Bright Spots

Drake Maye threw for 380 yards and three touchdowns

Josh Downs had 9 catches for 126 yards

Antoine Green had 4 catches for 112 yards and one touchdown

Caleb Hood had 10 carries for 48 yards and 5 catches for 32 yards and one receiving touchdown.

Elijah Green had 3 carries for 24 yards and two touchdowns.

Power Echols and Gio Biggers led the team in tackles with 8.

Will Hardy got his first career interception.

Needs Work

The defense needs to do a better job of tackling. They are missing entirely too many tackles and offenses are flourishing out there on the field as a result.

The secondary is improving, but still find themselves out of position on a few plays and still have quite a few blown assignments and coverages.

The rushing defense has to be much better. They need to do a better job of tackling in space and being in their gaps to stop huge running plays.

Offensively, Phil Longo needs to learn to not overthink his play-calling. His play-calling has become awful critical in key situations and downs. This has cost the Tar Heels leads and completely change the momentum of the game on far too many occasions.

Final Observations

With tonight’s win over Duke, the Tar Heels are now bowl-eligible as they move to 6-1 on the season. The Tar Heels are undefeated on the road this season, which is a complete turnaround from last season when they didn’t win any games on the road. The team seems to be moving in the right direction by finding different ways to win games.

The Tar Heels, however, do make games more difficult than they have to be. In this game, with a chance to take full control of the game, the Tar Heels had the ball after a huge stop by the defense but got no points. That just cannot happen. It put more pressure on a defense that has struggled with consistency and they let Duke back in the game.

The good thing is they were able to make enough plays to make up for their mistakes and pull out the win. They now remain on top of the ACC Coastal division and have a bye week coming up. This will allow them to continue to get better in areas they still struggle in. After the bye week, they have 5 games remaining as they look to finish the season as the team representing the ACC Coastal division in the ACC championship game. The next game will be on Saturday, October 29th against Pittsburgh.