The Missing Link: UNC Rushing Attack

The Carolina rushing attack has struggled to gain traction all season long, but the void was especially glaring Saturday against Virginia Tech. The tailback trio of T.J. Logan, Romar Morris and Elijah Hood combined for 15 yards on nine carries.

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Through five games in the 2014 season, the stable of highly-touted UNC running backs has only mustered a combined 450 yards.

Myriad factors are circulating as key contributors to the lack of production.

Freshman running back Elijah Hood says the UNC offense lacks any kind of flow due to sloppy mistakes.

“We shot ourselves in the foot a lot. That limited what we could do offensively. We had a lot of drives that we couldn’t get a good flow going. That threw us off. When our offense can’t get a rhythm, we struggle to move the ball,” Hood says.

Some of those errors include frustrating false start penalties that continue to plague the offensive line. Hood says the penalties destroy momentum.

“It can get frustrating. You obviously want to move the ball. When you’re moving the ball backwards, that’s the opposite of what we’re trying to do. Having those penalties hurts bad. We need to be moving forward and using our tempo. We can’t do that when we’re drawing penalties,” Hood says.

Frustratingly for Hood, he was handed the ball on a mere three occasions Saturday afternoon. Compare that to the Hokies, who gave the ball to Trey Edmunds 12 times and a whopping 20 handoffs went to Marshawn Williams.

It’s tough to get in any sort of rhythm with only three cracks at the ball. Hood says the penalty yardage, though, forces the Tar Heels away from a commitment to the run game and into more difficult passing situations.

“It’s pretty tough when you don’t get a lot of carries to get a good rhythm. Also, we were giving ourselves a lot of long field to get first downs. When that happens, it just makes it hard for running backs to run the ball. First and fifteen, it’s a little bit harder to run the football,” Hood says.

The youth of the UNC offensive linemen has been well-documented. But junior offensive guard Landon Turner says the Tar Heels need to get off to quicker starts and take care of their own assignments in order to set the running backs up for success.

“We didn’t really get a chance to run as many of our run plays that we had because we didn’t start fast enough this week. Guys need to buy in. There are breakdowns every play. You can look at the film. There’s a breakdown in someone’s position somewhere. We all have to come together and put a whole game together by doing our own jobs,” Turner says.

Junior quarterback Marquise Williams was named the ‘lone bright spot’ by head coach Larry Fedora in his postgame remarks Saturday. Williams says he has full confidence in his offense to stick together and overcome the issues in the run game.

“We got to keep attacking. The offensive line is going to do a much better job. I know a lot of guys are feeling down, but they’re going to do a tremendous job. I’m not going to turn my back on them. The running backs are going to keep believing. As long as they believe that if we can get them to the safety, they’re going to make them miss. Keep fighting hard, don’t turn your back on anybody, and come together as a family,” Williams says.