Welcome back to writing these, me. After two games of looking like a bad team playing against worse teams, UNC looked, for about 25 minutes — in Death Valley, no less — like… a decent team playing against a bad team. And then, well… the rest of the game happened, wherein they looked simply like a bad team. A game like this is always tough to grade, because the change in the game is so drastic that there’s no single story for a majority of the roster, and that makes assigning grades feel insufficient.
But it’s the exercise we’ve chosen, and so attempt it we shall. Here’s the Heels’ report card from a stunning 28-20 loss to Clemson, which surely will be reflective of just how much of a head-scratcher this game was, and how many questions the team, and perhaps the program, is surely facing as a result of it.
Quarterback: F
One thing that’s unambiguous is that Billy Edwards was flat-out bad in this game. There were some encouraging signs in the first quarter, as he escaped pressure a few times, scrambling for good yardage on a couple of occasions and finding receivers downfield on a couple of others. But warts began to show soon after. Clemson started doing a better job of containing him on the pocket, and without escape valves, Edwards got happy feet in the pocket and it killed his accuracy. Nearly every throw after his 9th that was more than 5 yards downfield was either overthrown or behind his target, and pretty frequently it was both. He finished with a dismal line of 13/30 for 135 yards, a touchdown (a blitz-replacing checkdown to Benjamin Hall), and the game-sealing interception. I was willing to give him a D or something similar for at least not putting the ball in harm’s way until that pick, but then it happened, putting the cap on as bad a quarterbacking performance as any we saw last year.
Even in the pre-snap stuff, which was supposed to be the big reason Edwards has the job over the other guys in the room, it didn’t look like the quarterback was on his game. At least three times, I saw him check into runs into loaded boxes that didn’t get more than three yards. And of course, we have to talk about the 4th and 1 that all but spoiled the Heels’ chances to come out of this game with a win. You can have problems with the call itself — verts in a short-yardage situation is certainly a choice, as we’ll discuss a little more later. But had Edwards not committed so early to testing the covered one-on-one deep downfield, he had a late-leaking tight end at the sticks for a much more reliable conversion. For all talk we might hear of him being a steady-veteran type, like I noted in my position preview, he’s a gunslinger at heart, and he’s showing that he’s not really a good enough player to cash the checks his heart is writing. I’m sure there will be conversations about making a move at this position, especially given UNC’s open week ahead of Notre Dame, and they’re probably warranted.
Running Backs: B-
Benjamin Hall had the best game of his career in Death Valley, running through Clemson’s first and second levels again and again to the tune of 18 totes for 130 yards (7.2 per carry). He added the aforementioned receiving touchdown with his only catch of the day, a catch and run from the flat on a nifty play from Bobby Petrino. Unfortunately, his last run was his worst, as he failed to convert a 3rd and 2 after getting hit early. Not really his fault, but that’s the nature of the position.
His backfield mates fared slightly worse. Demon June continued to do pretty well in his newfound role as red-zone weapon, scoring an early touchdown from in close, and with 5 of his 12 carries converting either first downs or touchdowns. But he also fumbled the ball away with barely any contact, deep in UNC territory, giving up an opportunity to score off a Clemson turnover and handing them 3 points. Jaylen McGill, after flashing arguably more than the other two through two weeks, had his worst outing as a Tar Heel yet, with 3 rushes for 13 yards, including a stuff that he kind of caused. He also had a drop, albeit on a slightly misplaced and overpowered throw from Edwards.
Wide Receivers and Tight Ends: C+
Breaking news: Jordan Shipp is good at football. The wide receiver led his team in catches and yards once again, with 6 for 68, and did it every way possible: short, intermediate, and deep, both on- and off-script. He was open even a lot more often than he got the ball, and just continues to impress with his overall football ability. That’s about where the accomplishments end for this group, though to be fair, they were pretty limited by their quarterback’s stinker of a game. Jelani Thurman notably came down to Earth after two high-production games. Targeted 9 times, he came down with just 3 catches for 18 yards, most of them manufactured. I think it’s fair to be a little concerned that the early production was a bit of a mirage caused by inferior competition and a little force-feeding — Belichick and staff did this a fair bit last year, too, with guys like Madrid Tucker — rather than a sign of an elite player. He did throw a few nice blocks in the run game, though.
Mason Humphrey was maybe the big disappointment of the day on offense. He was targeted 6 times and caught one ball for 17 yards early in the game, and he was the intended receiver on Edwards’ game-ending interception. It wasn’t a good throw, but Humphrey also loafed big-time on the route:
Humphrey had an opportunity to really earn the second outside receiver spot opposite Shipp after C.J. Sadler’s arrest, but this kind of thing isn’t going to advance his cause.
Offensive Line: A-
For large portions of the game, the UNC offensive line simply leaned on Clemson, opening up truck-sized holes for Hall. They were helped by Clemson’s shocking lack of gap integrity, but for most of the game, they were also simply stronger and better in the trenches than the guys across from them. The line of scrimmage was reset, over and over again, 3-4 yards downfield. They weren’t quite as sound in the pass game, as Edwards was pressured a fair bit and took three sacks, but they also gave him escape valves for much of the first half and I think Edwards exacerbated the pressure a fair bit. Center Christo Kelly had his best game as a Tar Heel, putting a few pancakes on tape. Freshman Cristian Alvarez, who rotated in at guard a bit, struggled.
Defensive Line: C
Xavier Lewis continued his torrid pace, adding two sacks to his ACC-leading tally. He’s got six sacks through 3 games, and in this one, flashed a nasty spin move that got him past interior linemen untouched multiple times. As he hones his craft, he’s going to have to learn to put that inside hand higher on the lineman’s torso rather than on his hip, but it certainly worked here. Leroy Jackson also had a sack, bulldozing an offensive lineman on his way to Tait Reynolds. Everything else… less pretty. The edge pressure, such a highlight last week, was nearly invisible this week in the pass game. Without Melkart Abou-Jaoude, both Donovan Hoilette and Jaylen Harvey were unable to consistently hold edges in the run game, allowing Clemson to gain yards outside the tackles. But the interior, while it stuffed a few runs, also gave up a fair bit of ground to running backs, especially as the game wore on and their depth was taken advantage of (even, bizarrely, after a 2-and-a-half-hour break). It cannot be overstated that Clemson had the worst running offense in the country before this game, and they put up 5.2 yards a carry on UNC with plenty of explosives.
Linebackers: D
Derek McDonald and Peyton Seelmann might have led the Heels in tackles, but it was not a good game for them. With so many of Clemson’s runs going to the outside, it was usually one of them who missed the last tackle that allowed a back to turn the corner. McDonald, on at least two occasions, got out-physicaled in the run game by a true freshman quarterback, while Seelmann continues to just look a step slow against Power Four competition. After a lot of talk around the program about how this was going to be one of the team’s most improved position groups thanks to aggressive portal hunting, it appears that it’s one of their weakest. And in a Belichick defense, that’s a really bad sign.
Secondary: C-
While UNC’s defensive breakdown was more in the run game than the pass game, Tait Reynolds did complete 20/29 passes for 215 yards and a touchdown, much of which was due to the Carolina secondary losing discipline and getting caught with their eyes in the backfield, leaving them liable to pump fakes and play action. The corner position opposite Jaiden Patterson was a serious problem with Tre Miller out, with Coleman Bryson and Peyton Waters looking miscast at the position and a few other guys just not up to the task. Patterson himself was far from infallible, giving up a 41-yard catch and run later in the game. Bryson, when he was playing safety, was a bit of a mixed bag, with 2 pass breakups on blitzes but also a few coverage losses and missed tackles. The lone bright spot may have been Greg Smith, who played enforcer on the back end with 7 tackles, helped force a Clemson fumble, and came up with a big-time interception that was aided by an awful throw but still required an impressive amount of range. He picked off another throw during the game, but it was called back for pass interference (not on him).
Special Teams: B-
Poor Aeron Burrell. Not for anything that actually happened for him, but because the “career long FG” line that ESPN put on the broadcast as UNC was driving down the field with a chance to score, placed inside the red zone because of his lack of experience, is one of the most accidentally brutal burns I’ve seen a sports production on TV make. Burrell increased his career long to 33 yards with one of his 2 kicks on the day, but missed a 47-yarder that would have extended the UNC lead to the three-score margin that the Heels ultimately never saw. As a punter, Burrell was better, grossing 47 yards a punt with not a lot of return yardage on Clemson’s end, and landing all 4 of his attempts inside the 20. Trech Kekahuna had a nice 15-yard punt return, but other than that, there’s not much more to say here.
Coaching: D
A lot has been made, and will continue to be made, of how flat UNC looked out of the weather delay. That’s probably a fair hit to make at Bill Belichick and his coaching staff, but that is not the only way in which this staff failed on Saturday. The play sequencing on offense was flatly bizarre, going away from a run game averaging nearly 6 yards a pop at really inopportune times. The defensive backfield having dirty eyes, multiple drives in a row, after that not really being a tendency through the first two games, points to a lack of focus and adjustment by the coaching staff. The defense’s energy flagging, well before the weather delay halfway through the fourth quarter, is either a conditioning or a depth issue, which I suppose isn’t a single-game coaching issue but is bad nonetheless. The Heels missed a lot more tackles and were called for a lot more penalties than they had the first two weeks, speaking to a preparation issue ahead of the game that may just have been caused by the staff’s involvement in and permissiveness towards some off-field shenanigans
And then there’s Bobby Petrino, who’d been such a breath of fresh air through two games. He had some of his usual tricks in this one, but the relationship between he and Edwards looked a lot less comfortable in Death Valley. With Edwards’ best stuff in the first quarter coming when he had some freedom to operate on the run, Petrino failed to respond to Clemson’s adjustment (and better execution) by finding other ways to get his quarterback on the move — no bootlegs or moving pockets, no designed runs, just forcing his quarterback to stand up to the ghosts he was clearly kind of seeing. And all that’s aside from that ill-fated 4th and 1. I think it’s maybe defensible to call verts in a short-yardage situation as long as there’s a checkdown, but the quarterback has to know that he’s only throwing it deep if one of his receivers has won. Not “I can throw him open,” not “trust my guy,” but “he is open.” You have to have trust in your quarterback’s arm and his brain if you’re going to make that call. Edwards had not earned it this season, and especially not this game, and so predictably, he did not do that, chucking it down to a covered Thurman, inaccurately at that, before Carson Sneed could leak out into the flat after throwing a block. The moment Edwards throws, Sneed is uncovering himself at the sticks (see arrows):
(I suppose it’s also worth noting that Edwards has an acre of green to his left at this point, though with the linebacker triggering here, the available yardage is probably closer to 5 than 20. Still, it’s an easy first)
There’s no question Petrino is an upgrade from the guy UNC had in his position last year (and coincidentally was looking at on the opposite sideline, though not as a coordinator), but he’s got to work better with his quarterback, and also probably needs a better quarterback, if this team is going to be anything of note this season. As for the rest of it… I wish the fix were as visible or as simple. Certainly, I think anybody who was adamant that Bill Belichick has “figured out how to operate in college football,” or that Mike Lombardi’s resignation was actually just the removal of an obstacle in the way of him being good at this job, should be eating a healthy serving of crow. That was a badly-coached football game, no two ways about it.
