University of North Carolina Athletics
Turner's Take: More Of The Same
December 4, 2015 | Football, Featured Writers, Turner Walston
By Turner Walston
Just after they walked off the field in the loss to South Carolina way back on September 3, the 2015 Tar Heels made a promise to themselves: they'd be back on the field at Bank of America Stadium in three months for the ACC Championship game, as Coastal Division champions.
“I just told the guys, 'Look, we're going to get back to Charlotte in December,'” said senior linebacker Jeff Schoettmer. “And we've been talking about that even throughout the off-season. We had our spring game in Charlotte, and we were talking about how we were going to play in Charlotte three times this year: our spring game, the opener against South Carolina and the ACC Championship.”
And so here they are, winners of 11 straight, just hours away now from taking the field against Atlantic Division champion Clemson. While Larry Fedora's team had two primary goals entering the 2015 season: the ACC Coastal Division championship and the state championship, they have only been able to accomplish those goals by going week to week, focusing on one opponent, one game at a time. They keep the larger goal in mind, but understand that only by taking care of the details, sticking to fundamentals from Sunday to Friday will they allow themselves to win, and keep winning, on Saturdays. So in preparing for the biggest game of their careers, arguably the biggest game in 35 years of Carolina football history, the Tar Heels know they must stick to the routine that has gotten them to this stage.
“This is 'ship week right here,” Mack Hollins said after Tuesday's practice. “It's the biggest one so far. It's the biggest week we've had all season, and if you want to be a champion, like the guys say they want to be, it's going to take the work of a champion. You can't just stop at the end of the season and think, 'We won 11 straight, so I think we're good, we can just roll on over,' [Clemson has] won 12 straight, so they have one up on us.”
As the season has rolled on, the stakes have gotten a bit higher each and every week. By winning game, the Tar Heels made it more important for them to win games. They were bowl-eligible by late October whereas past Carolina teams have waited weeks longer for that all-important sixth win. By beating Pitt on a Thursday two days before Halloween, they kept themselves in front of the Panthers for the Coastal Division lead. They weren't listed in the initial College Football Playoff rankings, but as they've won, have gradually crawled into the top ten. It's an ascent that has happened not by shying away from stakes, but by embracing them, trusting that what has gotten them this far will continue to work.
“I think Coach Fedora has done a phenomenal job of keeping the team very grounded,” said defensive coordinator Gene Chizik, himself a two-time national champion. “We're all creatures of habit. As I told the defense, we all have to have a capacity for boredom. You really do, because we just do the same things over and over and over every day, and I think that's what lets you enables you to improve. But that all starts with Coach Fedora, and he has done an amazing job of keeping these guys focused and locked in, and never deviating off the same path every week.”
A capacity for boredom. Being willing to take on the tedious. Practice reps might be boring, but if they are executed, drilled to perfection, the results, the reward won't be boring at all. “Coach Chizik teaches us to be paranoid,” senior cornerback Malik Simmons said. “Paranoid, in the means of always trying to get better, never getting bored with practice, just always being paranoid about technique, tackling, tracking, learning the defense.”
That has paid off: the Tar Heel defense is allowing 18.2 fewer points per game than a year ago. Each of the players on the field is doing his job and trusting his teammates to do theirs, and instead of sitting at home waiting to be told they're heading to Detroit for the Quick Lane Bowl, the Tar Heels have positioned themselves for so much greater.
Once the Tar Heels had accomplished their primary goals, their was a re-calibration of sorts. A Coastal Division championship enables the possibility of an ACC championship. Time to set another goal. “No one is complacent,” Fedora said on Monday. “It was like, 'We've got work to do,' and that's why, in establishing the new goals, I'm confident in these guys, because I know how they're going to come to work tomorrow. I know how they're going to come to work on Wednesday. I know how they're going to come to work on Thursday. And their consistency throughout this whole year has made this process so much fun for this coaching staff.”
By listening to their coaches, by sticking to routine, by having one another's back, the Tar Heels have gotten right back to where they started: in Charlotte, playing a team from South Carolina, but this time with much more on the line. “It just shows us that if you do what you've got to do, the team is going to be successful,” sophomore defensive end Dajaun Drennon said. “Coach Fedora has been preaching that ever since we've been here, but it's like we're finally buying into it, and it's finally coming to notice.”
These Tar Heels have shown that capacity for boredom. By trusting the process throughout the week, they are celebrating when the final whistle blows on Saturdays. And so ahead of this most important game, they must maintain their routines.
“The stakes get higher every week,” Simmons said. “That brings back that paranoia. The stakes are higher now, so we have to be even better this week, but that doesn't mean we change what we do.”
Every day in practice, in film, in meetings and walkthrough, it's more of the same of what has worked to date, all in the belief that come Saturday, it will be more of the same, again.
Turner Walston is the editor of CAROLINA digital magazine. Follow Turner on Twitter.
