University of North Carolina Athletics
Extra Points: New Twist To Old Story
October 19, 2008 | Football, Featured Writers, Lee Pace
Oct. 19, 2008
by Lee Pace, Extra Points
Clemson's Terrence Oglesby held the basketball on the left wing with less than a minute to play in the first overtime in February in the Smith Center, the Tar Heels leading 88-87 after rallying from 11 down just two minutes earlier. Oglesby had made one of 10 field goals against the Heels five weeks earlier in Clemson and would convert just two of 11 on this night, and now he was ready to launch one of those fire-ready-aim three-pointers. He double-pumped in the air. He was leaning. Wayne Ellington was in his face.
And the ball went in.
Okay, I thought. This streak is struck. It is finally time for Clemson to win a basketball game in Chapel Hill after 53 tries, ending one of the weirdest runs of intra-rivalry domination in all of sports.
Not so fast. Tar Heels caught fire in the last three minutes and stormed back for a 103-93 win over Clemson, a victory that served as a nasty tease to the Tigers and their tortured fans. There were four Clemson fans nearby; I didn't even look their way for fear of feeling like a rubber-necking geek passing a highway wreck.
"Tonight was the night," Clemson's James Mays said. "We had all the ingredients, all the pieces ... I don't know if it's ever going to get done."
Turnabout is fair play, and Tar Heel fans today are dressing their wounds with salt after another visit to their own house of horrors in another sport. On Saturday in chilly Charlottesville, Virginia stormed 82 yards in nine plays at the game's end to force overtime. With the momentum crackling through the Cavaliers and their fans, it seemed almost an afterthought that they would prevail in overtime, which they did, 16-13. Virginia has now won 14 straight meetings between the Cavaliers and Tar Heels in Scott Stadium, dating back to 1983.
"Providence," said Cavalier coach Al Groh.
"God blessed them and smiled on them," noted Tar Heel safety Deunta Williams.
"Somebody else had different plans for us," added linebacker Mark Paschal.
Those comments were responses to questions about the game's most curious play, a crucial point-after attempt by Cavalier Robert Randolph with 47 seconds left in regulation that was blocked by Williams, who jumped like Olympic great Dwight Stones high over the line of scrimmage. The ball was certainly wounded by Williams' hand, but it had just enough life in it to flutter and twist and dangle over the goalpost.
"It cleared by six or seven inches," Williams said. "I got a good piece of it."
Some things in life and sports are simply unexplainable. This is one of them. Given the dormant period of the last half of the Dick Crum era and the beginnings of the Mack Brown era from 1983-91 and the totally fallow period of the last decade of Carolina football, that Virginia might hold the upper hand given its recent consistency is not that surprising. But for Virginia to have won every one in Charlottesville over more than quarter of a century defies reason.
The glum post-game interview session for a select group of Tar Heels and coach Butch Davis was well underway before anyone broached the subject of streaks and curses. An Associated Press reporter from Richmond arrived in the middle of quarterback Cam Sexton's Q&A with reporters and broke in, "Forgive me if this has been asked before, but was there much talk about the streak?"
"No, we don't care about streaks," Sexton answered with conviction. "A lot of guys on this team haven't been up here to play before. Nobody's concerned with that kind of stuff. We're concerned with winning ball games in the moment, end of story."
At least this game was competitive and one everyone leaving the stadium knew should have been won by the Tar Heels. That's quite a contrast from 2002 (when the Tar Heels were 3-9 and outscored by Virginia 37-7 in the second half); from 2004 (when Virginia bolted in front 35-7 midway in the second quarter); and from 2006 (when Virginia pounded the Heels 23-0 in as limp a Tar Heel performance in memory). Indeed, the Tar Heels dominated first downs (11-3), total yards (174-59) and possession time (17:31-12:29) in the first half as they took a 7-0 lead in an old-school, ground-oriented battle that featured tailbacks Shaun Draughn of the Tar Heels and Cedric Peerman of the Cavaliers. For the game, Carolina outrushed Virginia 166-58--a major accomplishment given each team's strengths and weaknesses through mid-season.
"Defensively, we played about as well as we could in the first half," Davis said. "Our defense had a good grasp of what they were trying to do. We had some success running the ball and making a few plays. But we didn't capitalize on some field position opportunities and score as many points as we needed."
"We knew we had to run the football and we did run it well that first drive and we made a few throws," Sexton added. "I guess they adjusted to it. I haven't seen the film, obviously. There will be some tell-tale signs on the film."
The momentum shifted early in the second half when the Tar Heels committed turnovers on their first two possessions, leading to one Virginia field goal. That the Cavaliers converted those miscues into only three points was actually quite a positive for Carolina. But the Tar Heel offense struggled to convert third downs and was out of synch in using a variety of new substitutions and personnel groups in trying to fill the void vacated by Brandon Tate. They had to burn all three second-half timeouts because of formation and communication issues and were out of timeouts late in the game (hence the decision to run out the clock with 47 seconds to play). Yet the Heels did cobble together a late drive that led to a Casey Barth field goal and a 10-3 lead with 2:22 to play.
You had to figure that as well as the defense had played ... with the inevitable swing by Lady Luck that had to come ... with the Heels' newfound skills of winning close games at the end ... You had to figure this was the time when the curse would finally be put to rest.
The following Virginia drive would become as infamous in Heels-In-Hooville lore as the Antwan Harris interception return in 1996 and the Sam Aiken fumble-at-the-goal in 2002. Cavalier QB Marc Verica directed a precise march of nine plays over 82 yards for the tying touchdown, including seven completions in eight attempts. Afterward Davis and several Tar Heel defenders were questioned about Carolina's defensive mindset--in general rush three linemen and drop eight in coverage.
Davis said the Tar Heels were not in a "prevent defense" mentality. "We were trying to get to the quarterback, trying to pressure, trying to be in the right place," he said. "We had chances, we probably had one or two or maybe even three opportunities for interceptions. We just missed the ball. Those balls had gone to us in the previous six games. Today they did not."
Williams and Paschal both noted a couple of botched assignments and the inability of anyone to step up and make a big play as they had in recent weeks against Miami, UConn and Notre Dame.
"We had a little bit of a coverage bust, a couple of big plays, and they were right back in the ball game," Paschal said. "It was just one of those things, it seem to snowball on us a little bit and we weren't able to recover."
Added Williams: "It just showed our defense has a lot to improve on. We were dominating for the most part. We really should at the end have stopped them."
The big play on the drive was a 26-yard completion from Verica to Maurice Covington, who somehow found an opening in front of the Tar Heel sideline behind Jordan Hemby, in front of Williams and the to the side of Quan Sturdivant.
"From their perspective at that point, they're trying to force us to throw shorter passes so they can just tackle us inbounds so the time will wind down," Verica said. "But we were able to find some soft spots in their zones, and we executed tremendously.
"The game is 60 minutes long, not 58, not 59," he continued. "This team has shown we're great in the last five minutes."
Twenty-four hours later, Davis was queried again about the defensive lapses late in the game and said the plan was the same one that had kept Virginia under wraps all day.
"It's unbelievable how 20-20 the hindsight is the day after," Davis said. "You'd love to have gotten sacks, you'd like to have gotten interceptions. But the unfortunate thing is we did some things yesterday we hadn't done all year long. You've heard us kind of halfway jokingly talk about `not biting the cheese,' not jump underneath routes, not jump shallow routes, and making sure you keep the ball in front of you. Unfortunately, we didn't do it in the two-minute drill. The same things we did in that drive are the same things that allowed them to have very, very little success the first 57 minutes of the ball game. They made some plays at the most opportune time."
Now it's on to Boston College and a post-defeat week similar to the one the Heels endured a month ago after a painful loss to Virginia Tech. Carolina will continue to plan for Tate's absence and could well have another major personnel issue to deal with. Linebacker Bruce Carter, who blocked another kick Saturday (his fifth of the year), was severely hobbled late in the game with a sprained ankle.
"I see a team absolutely devastated in the lockerroom to know that they could have won a game here today," Sexton said. "We've got great leadership on this team and we're not going to sulk, we're going to move on, just like we have after losses. We've had some adversity in the past, and we're going to move forward. It's going to be in a great direction."
One thing that does happen each time the Tar Heels travel north to Charlottesville and lose a game: The sun comes up the next day. Sunday was bright and cloudless in Chapel Hill, a pristine fall day. And don't forget this date: Clemson comes to the Smith Center on January 21st, 2009.
Chapel Hill writer Lee Pace is in his 19th year of chronicling Carolina football through "Extra Points." He'll answer questions about the Tar Heels weekly throughout the season through his "Extra Points Mailbag" and on the pregame show for the Tar Heel Sports Network. Email him at leepace@nc.rr.com and include your name and hometown. No recruiting questions, please.
Players Mentioned
