It is fitting that to the winner of today’s game at Kenan Stadium between North Carolina (6-5, 2-5 in the ACC) and Duke (3-8, 1-6 in the ACC) goes the Victory Bell, since it seems both teams truly need a wake up call. It’s going to be “Senior Day” for the Tar Heels, meaning that for the last time the fan base will watch quarterback Bryn Renner find his favorite receiver, Dwight Jones, in the friendly confine of Kenan. But for both teams this is the last time to have a shining moment in a season that didn’t have many. UNC has lost four of the last five games, while Duke is on a six game slide. The series, which is at its 98th meeting, has been in the Tar Heels favor, winning 20 of the 21 match ups, but interim head coach Everett Withers, who could also be in his last game at home, best have his team ready to go as the Blue Devils always play hard in this one said this of the game today…
“This isn’t about records or anything,” he said. “It’s about being eight miles away.”
In all seventeen seniors will be honored before the 3:30 pm EST kick off (ESPN3), and you have to admit that for those young men their stay in Chapel Hill has been a bit like a roller coaster ride. Their careers went from working their way forward as their ex head coach pushed North Carolina upward in the ranking of the conference, to the debacle of the NCAA investigation, to the firing of the man that brought them to UNC, to the aftermath of all of the above mentioned. Today they get to wrap it all up and move forward towards their next chapter of their lives. Just for that I am hoping that the stadium is packed and that the fan base give them a great send off!
Those seniors are also the players that have helped this program go to its fourth straight bowl game, to have once again a 1,000 yard rusher, and to have brought some of the fan base to believe that the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is not just a basketball school, or as Dean Smith once said, a soccer school that wins sometimes in basketball. Today tail back Giovani Bernard (1,057 yds on 196 carries with 12 TDs), who suffered a mild concussion, will be on the gridiron trying to beat the in-state rivals for the eighth time in a row. In the last years UNC has taken advantage of the running game to beat their opponent, and there is no reason why this should not happen once again with the first 1,000 rusher in 14 years highlighted in the offensive playbook. Of course, if Bernard can get his way this will also open up the game for QB Bryn Renner, using the play action to find his many weapons, including Jones, who has 69 catches this season for 1,018 yards and eight touchdowns.
On the defensive side the UNC secondary will be tested as Duke does have two good wide outs of their own and if the D Line can not get to QB Sean Renfree, who has called this game Duke’s Super Bowl, this could be a long day. On that line, defensive end Quinton Coples is also a senior and playing his last game in front of his home crowd. Expected to go very high in the draft the young man just didn’t have as good of a season as many hoped. While his draft stock won’t change much due to this game I am sure that he too would like to go out with a great game.
For both of these teams this game is important, up to a point. For UNC their options are pretty much locked in for bowl games possibilities, even worst, they will be also attached to what N.C. State does, a team they lost to. For Duke, there is no bowl season, win or lose. On the other hand, for both squads, who did not live up to their season’s outlook, who both have slid in the second half of the season, this game can be the silver lining both coaching staff can cling on to. It’s going to take a win today and one in the bowl game for the Tar Heels to match their 8 wins seasons they have had in 2009 and 2010. And while it can be said that for two years in a row the team had to battle both opponents on the field and problems off of it, the reality is that “it is what it is” and for this season it’s been a let down. Winning today is not going to change that, but it’s going to give these young men a good send off, the fan base a reason to believe and come back next season, and for all to close two years of problems in a positive note.
“I feel like we’re a better football team now than we were at the beginning of the year,” interim coach Everett Withers said earlier this week. “I think you’ll hear a lot of coaches say they’ve gotten better but their record may not be better. I heard Coach [David] Cutcliffe say it.”
“He said he has a good football team that doesn’t have a good record. I think he’s right.”
I could not disagree with this more. For anyone that watched North Carolina this year their losses were not because of a single play going the wrong way, a bad mistake at the wrong time, a mishap, or whatever else. Some losses truly seemed to be lackluster performances where the team was not “into it”, or did not show up for what could have been a win. Today, at Kenan Stadium, that can not be the case, win or lose! Let’s be realistic here, this game is to “award” who is going to be the bottom dweller of the Coastal Division. Carolina is a 13 points favorite in this one and if they want to finish the season on a high note they need to cover and then some. Unfortunately, just like the last games between these two teams, I have a feeling it’s going to be closer than it should, with the Tar Heels taking it 28 to 20.
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