Week 9 Preview

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The schedule is looking pretty thin this week with only two matchups between ranked teams: #22 Arizona at #13 Texas Tech and #3 Georgia versus #17 Florida in Atlanta. Texas Tech has pulled off the seemingly impossible feat of making people hate an irrelevant school in Lubbock, Texas. The overgrown trailer park has accomplished this through the efforts of annoying super booster billionaire Cody Campbell. He gives money, he buys players and coaches, he tweets a lot and whines when things don’t go his way. As the Belichick hire at Carolina has demonstrated, there is no better path to success in college sports than having entitled boosters call the shots for the athletic department.

One of the great events of the college football season, the World’s Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party, is indoors this year, which is a travesty of epic proportions. Domes for sporting events have always been an abomination, and this particular game is one that should never be played indoors, on plastic. Seeing the game go down to the wire in the late afternoon sun in Jacksonville is a rite of passage for all true college football fans. Thankfully, it will return there once renovations are completed to the Jags Stadium.  

California @ NC State (NCSU -7, O/U 56.5)

State has a chance to accomplish something that most rational observers would have never thought possible, losing to Stanford and Cal on consecutive weekends. However, interim head coach and current Chi O McKenzie Goins is confident in the face of adversity, predicting, “A really super fun time at the game and at the Lamda Chi party afterwards, come see all the hunky guys!”  My dream scenario is that State loses to Cal but finishes off the season by beating Florida State and UNC on the road. Football Gods, I beseech you to make this happen.

#17 Florida versus #3 Georgia in Atlanta (UGA -12.5, O/U 55.5)

This line seems pretty high given that Florida has already beaten Auburn, Ole Miss, and Texas. Georgia’s only significant win this year is beating Alabama by three, which of course is a big win, but I’d put the Dawgs as a seven point favorite in this game if I was handicapping it. John Sumrall could really get Gators fans excited for the future if he can pull off a big win in Georgia’s backyard; but Kirby Smart is 7-2 against Florida, winning the last five in a row. I’m predicting the upset here, the Gators not only cover, but win outright.

Virginia @ #14 Wake Forest (WFU -12.5, O/U 49.5)

The Deacs are on a roll and Jake Dickert has demonstrated that he knows how to keep his team focused on the task at hand and not look ahead. Every Wake fan I know is thinking this is our year and we’re going to see Miami again in the ACC Championship. However, there are still four more conference games to navigate and last place Syracuse (Who could they possibly beat?) isn’t on the schedule. Fortunately, Wake Forest is not a program that is prone to overconfidence, hype and high expectations don’t show up in Winston-Salem very often, and that’s just the way we like it. The Deacs take care of business this weekend and get ready for the stretch run.

#1 Miami @ North Carolina (Miami -14, O/U 52.5)

The rumors were flying last week that once Carolina beat Syracuse ESPN would announce GameDay was coming to Chapel Hill for this big game. The script was written, the resurgent Heels against the top team in the country, big time football is back at Kenan Stadium! Instead, GameDay decided to head to the football Mecca of Bloomington, Indiana to see the Hoosiers play Minnesota. The Hoosiers are favored by 20 in that game, so ESPN chose an expected blowout over Carolina. It seems like we’re not too far from seeing Bill and Jordon working as casino greeters in Danville, VA. Bill wearing an old Patriots hoodie with a mustard stain on the front and Jordon wearing sparkly bootie shorts and a halter top she got at Buc-ee’s. Normally at this time of year folks in Chapel Hill take comfort that basketball season is just around the corner, but after losing to Indiana by 18 and going to overtime against Charlotte in the preseason, even that looks ominous. Oh well, at least the field hockey . . . never mind.  

-John R. Fisher

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THIS IS WHAT WE DO, BILL. WE BEAT MIAMI!!!

No. 1 Miami comes to Kenan Stadium Saturday at 7:30 p.m. on ABC. History says Carolina doesn't need to be the better-ranked team to win. It just needs to remember who it is.

By Ed Hanes Jr.

Hey...Coach Bill Belichick, at 7:30 Saturday night ABC will introduce America to No. 1 Miami.  I want you to introduce Miami to something else: a Carolina football tradition few of these Hurricanes are aware of.  Around here, beating the Hurricanes isn't some unimaginable accomplishment. It's something we've made a pretty good habit of doing.

The last time Kenan hosted this kind of prime-time spectacle, TCU beat us like a forgotten rented mule, 48–14, in front of God and everybody. I refuse to believe we invited the cameras back just to provide another humiliation in high definition. And yes, Syracuse happened. We can discuss quarterbacks, missed throws, and wrecked Corvettes another day. Saturday demands something different: winning a football game nobody outside Chapel Hill expects us to win.

Because beating Miami (even Miami at its loudest, highest-ranked, and most self-impressed) is what Carolina does.

Go back to John Bunting in 2004. An unranked Carolina team took down No. 4 Miami, 31–28, on Connor Barth's last-second field goal. Since then, across 20 meetings, Carolina has won 12 on the field. Twelve. Count them all. Over those games, the average score has been virtually even: Miami 28.4, Carolina 27.7.

And here's the revealing part. Assign every unranked team a notional No. 35 ranking so that every matchup counts, and Miami's average game-day ranking was No. 24.1. Carolina's was No. 32.2. The Hurricanes generally arrived with the shinier national credentials, the bigger reputation, and considerably more swagger. Carolina still won more often.

The last ten meetings? Seven Carolina victories. The last five? Five straight. Remember hanging 59 on Miami in 2015? Or storming into South Florida in 2020 and hanging 62 on the ninth-ranked Hurricanes? And the last time Miami visited Kenan, Carolina sent them home with a 41–31 loss. That's not wishful thinking. That's our history.

UNC vs. Miami — Last 10 Meetings

2014–2023 | Carolina leads the series 7–3

*No. 35 is your assigned analytical ranking for unranked teams, not an official AP ranking.

Which brings me to another thing we ought to remember: We don't play Miami to collect moral victories.

We don't play them tough, lose, and then spend the following week complaining about the referees. Yeah, Wake Forest, I'm talking about you. And we don't spend December complaining about when we played Miami, how the playoff committee treated us, and then refuse to play in a bowl game when we don't get our way. I'm looking dead at you, Marcus Freeman and your gang of Irish.  Shut up and beat somebody. Both of you.

Now, Bill, I'm not suggesting this Miami team isn't really good...the way all of today's best teams are.   Really good....but not FSU 90's, Miami 80's, or Joe Burrow LSU...extraordinary.  They're undefeated, ranked No. 1, and loaded with talent. And Carolina has never beaten a top-ranked opponent. Nobody with any sense would confuse this with an easy assignment.

But that's precisely why you were hired. Not to explain why Carolina can't beat great teams. Not to make losing respectable. And certainly not to collect another round of compliments about how hard your players fought against superior talent.

You were hired to change what's possible.

So throw 85 bodies at those dudes. Put up a fucking fight. Block somebody. Tackle somebody. Pressure the quarterback. Protect the football. Make those Hurricanes uncomfortable from the opening kickoff until the final whistle. Win 53 of the 100 plays that will take approximately 6 seconds to run.  And when Miami inevitably makes its run, don't fold, don't flinch, and don't start congratulating yourselves for keeping it close.

Go win the game!

I'm not interested in hearing that Carolina gave the nation's No. 1 team all it could handle. I'm not interested in another courageous defeat, another moral victory, or another Monday explaining how close we came to doing something special (or arguing that the Syracuse receiver never actually crossed the goal line on that two-point conversion. How about just getting the defense off the field on third-and-21? How about not throwing a ten-yard touchdown pass into the dirt? How about that?)

We've beaten Miami when they were ranked higher. We've beaten Miami when they had better players. We've beaten Miami when the entire country thought they were better than us. And we've done it often enough that nobody should pretend this is some impossible dream.

Bill, I don't want Miami leaving Kenan remembering how hard Carolina fought. I want them leaving Kenan remembering that they lost! I want that television audience to see a Carolina program that understands its history, embraces the moment, and refuses to bow to anybody simply because there's a number beside their name.  I want the ACC office angry (and the road to Charlotte reopened).

This is what we do, Bill.

Not almost. Not admirably. Not in spirit.

We beat Miami. Damnit!