UNC Tar Heels Football Team Falls Apart in the Final Two Minutes

by Derrick Isaiah Clyburn

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The North Carolina football team traveled up to Raleigh to face off against their in-state rival NC State for their final game of the regular season. The Tar Heels got off to a slow start with a quick 3 and out and an early blocked punt that led to an NC State touchdown.

The Wolfpack would then score on their next drive and jump out to a 14-0 lead. The Heels were held scoreless for the first quarter before the offense started to click in the second quarter. Carolina would then score 24 unanswered points that were sparked by the defense and the offense capitalized on every opportunity. This would make the score 24-14.

However, NC State did not quit and kept fighting to the very end. With just over two minutes left, North Carolina led 30-21 and NC State would score a touchdown on their very next drive due to a blown coverage by the UNC secondary to bring the game within two points. NC State would then recover the onside kick on the very next play and then drive down the field for the go-ahead touchdown with just over a minute left in the game, a drive that was extended by some questionable flags thrown by the referees. Nevertheless, the Tar Heels would have one more chance to take the lead but would fail to score leading to their 34-30 loss.

UNC Game Stats

UNC Total Offense– 444 yards

Rushing 297 Passing 147

UNC Passing: Sam Howell 14-26-147 yds 1TD 1INT

UNC Rushing: Ty Chandler 6-59 yds, British Brooks 15-124 yds, Sam Howell 18-98 yds 2TDs

UNC Receiving: Josh Downs 8-75 yds, Justin Olson 2-28 yds 1TD

NC State Total Offense– 360 yards

NC State Passing: Devin Leary 19-30-247 yds 4TDs

NC State Rushing: Ricky Person Jr. 11-63 yds, Zonovan Knight 9-69 yds

NC State Receiving: Emeka Emezie 5-112 yds 2TDs, Thayer Thomas 4-48 yds 1TD

UNC Bright Spots

Sam Howell threw for 142 yards and one touchdown. He also had 18 carries for 98 yards and 2 touchdowns.

British Brooks had 15 carries for 124 yards

Josh Downs had 8 catches for 75 yards.

Justin Olson got his first career touchdown.

Tomon Fox had 2.5 sacks.

Needs Work

The Tar Heels defense has struggled all year long to defend the run and it was no different in this game as they gave up 100 yards rushing. It has a lot to do with the 4-2-5 scheme that they run and their struggles with tackling.

The Tar Heels have to be much better at situational football. Down the stretch of this game, the offense struggled to score touchdowns in the RedZone due to questionable play calling and the defense was not in the right coverages to stop the deep ball, which allowed NC State to score and take the lead to win the game.

Final Observations

This was one of the worst losses since Mack Brown has been back as a coach for the Tar Heels. It was a total collapse in the final minutes of the game for both the players and coaches. They had no business losing this game. It was just a bad way to end the season that did not meet expectations.

If the Tar Heels want to be better in the years to come, changes have to be made. The offense was good overall throughout the season, but they were not good situationally when crunch time came around Iate in games. The defense was up and down all season long and most of the time was the Achilles heel for this team. For these very reasons, the Tar Heels ended the season with a 6-6 record.

Although this was nowhere near the season Sam Howell expected to have as far as team success goes, if that was indeed his last game as a Tar Heel, he had one of the best careers for a North Carolina football quarterback.

Sam Howell became the eighth quarterback in ACC history to throw for over 10,000 career yards and has the most TD passes in ACC history by a player in 3 or fewer seasons with 91. Josh Downs also had one of the best seasons for a UNC wide receiver in North Carolina football history. Downs set the UNC single-season receiving yards record with 1,198 yards.