I’ve been a college football fan for more than 50 years. That dates back to an older brother who put a hole in the garage drywall after Alabama surrendered a late lead to Notre Dame in the 1974 Sugar Bowl. That punch announced the sport as Something Serious, a fall weekend ritual that would govern the emotional health of a lot of people in my life for the coming week. I’ve been hooked ever since.
Like most fans, I trust my eye test. It’s well honed. However, I’ve become a bit of a stats nerd, given
the explosion of data points available now. First, our eyes can’t catch everything, especially in a sport where our eyes tend to follow the ball. Second, our priors like to guide our eyes to what we want to see, while sometimes blinding us to things we should probably be paying more attention to. Between Saturdays, I like to dig into the numbers and see what they can add (or subtract) from what I saw.
Note: my interests tend to be more random than linear. I’m not hunting a formula or pattern to predict a result, just reliving Saturdays through spread sheets, hunting curiosities. I’m also an English and history major, UNC ‘90, hardly an expert at numbers. Feel free to point out any idiocies.
The Defense: Eyes say…
…this is the most fundamentally sound defense we’ve seen in Chapel Hill in a long time.
…two straight games without allowing an offensive touchdown? Is that allowed anymore?
Eye Test summary: Tackling’s better. Angles are better. Run fits are better. Getting off blocks is better. It’s the sort of defensive competency that we can only wish had been paired with offenses featuring Sam Howell, Drake Maye, Josh Downs, Tez Walker, Omarion Hampton, etc. Depth: problem. Lack of future pros: problem. Still, this is far better defensive coaching than we’ve seen in Chapel Hill in a long time.
The Defense: Numbers say…
…94, 63, 99, 105, 49, 58, 95, 116, 97, 72.
Those are the past 10 years of total defense rankings for UNC. We’re hungry for something better, and the Belichick brand is all about defense. And that can affect how we see things.
…69.
This is currently UNC’s defensive ranking in yards per game.
…54.
This is currently UNC’s defensive ranking in yards per play.
…73.
This is currently UNC’s defensive ranking in SP+, which adjusts for opponent strength and tempo. It’s also still using some preseason talent measures, which for this roster are probably total guesses. Grain of salt and all that.
How did our opponents’ offenses to date do against other competition?
TCU
UNC: 542 yards, 7.53 per play
Abilene Christian: 489 yards, 8.15 yards per play.
UNC-Charlotte
App State: 218 yards, 4.04 yards per play
UNC: 271 yards, 3.82 yards per play
Monmouth: 563 yards, 7.83 yards per play
Richmond
Lehigh: 181 yards, 3.0 yards per play
Wofford: 272 yards, 3.9 yards per play
UNC: 199 yards, 3.2 yards per play
Numbers summary: The defense so far is appreciably better than our 10-year median experience. It’s also average, dead center of the bell curve. So far. Which, again, is definitely a step up from “horrendous.” The comps suggest it’s been about on par with Lehigh’s and App State’s defenses. And yes, transitive comps are how, at the end of every season, we can joke that a 3 win team is better than the national champ. Just interesting, not definitive.
Conclusions?
We could be seeing week-over-week improvement, which would make complete sense for a new staff with a new roster. Or…
…We could be seeing a defense that was hapless against TCU, good against a bad FBS team, and dominant against a FCS offense… that was also dominated by Lehigh (and badly struggled against 0-3 Wofford).
I hope you weren’t expecting something more revelatory than that. We’re operating off three games here, plus dealing with opponent samples that include more FCS data points than FBS. We’ll have far more clarity at the halfway point. UCF is largely an unknown on offense at this point, delivering average results against Jacksonville State and dominant stats against NC A&T. Clemson is somehow turning an experienced group of four- and five-stars on offense into merely an above-average outfit that sputters at the worst moments. Cal has an intriguing freshman QB in a new offense which has been average so far. Still, paired with a Justin Wilcox defense, that’s been good enough to be undefeated with a stretch of very winnable games in front of the Golden Bears. Still, none of those offenses look frightening.
Caveat Number: 119. That’s where the offense ranks nationally in Time of Possession (26:30 per game). That’s okay if your O features the sort of explosiveness that eats up yardage in chunks and finishes drives. It’s not okay when your defense lacks depth and your offense ranks near the bottom of FBS in explosive plays and points per drive. Offensive inefficiency is hanging this defense out to dry.
What do the numbers tell my eyes to watch for in the next game? UCF’s offensive 3rd downs.
UNC’s defense ranks 117th in opponent 3rd down conversions. Opponents move the chains on almost half of their 3rd downs against Carolina, and that contributes to defensive fatigue as well. 3rd downs go a long way towards defining a defense and showing improvement.
Go Heels!
