To paraphrase Taylor Swift: love is a game, and it ends when it ends.
Saturday’s game ended with consequences in the Carolina-Duke football series that is now .500 over the last 10 and 14 years. The Tar Heels lost their last chance to keep a bowl bid alive in Bill Belichick’s college premiere year. Duke now goes bowling with the sixth win of its own up-and-down season, as the Blue Devils started blitzing UNC quarterback Gio Lopez before they scored the go-ahead touchdown on a fake field goal that left the Heels bamboozled.
It was a close, chippy, mistake-prone affair for UNC at Kenan Stadium, which has seen the worst and best of The Hoodie’s foray into college football over the past 12 weeks. On Labor Day, a jam-packed crowd hoping UNC had hired a savior coach fled early as TCU provided a dose of reality, winning 48-14. In the last home game of the season — Senior Day for a patchwork roster — the Tar Heels showed how much they have improved over those three months.
The 32-25 defeat was harder to take than being blown out by the Horned Frogs, who hold a respectable 7-4 record but have not played like one of the nation’s best teams. If the Heels could have reversed their three one-score losses (Cal, Virginia and Duke), they would also be 7-4.
The pushing and shoving indicative of a rivalry game began on the opening kickoff, with Lopez marching the Heels 75 yards for a touchdown on his five-yard sprint to the house. It was similar to the opening drive of the season vs. TCU — when Lopez hit his first major college pass to receiver Jordan Shipp for 39 yards that helped set up a touchdown run by Caleb Hood, one of a few players who left the team during the season.
Unlike in the opener, the Tar Heels showed far more emotion and the game stayed close until the bitter end. Combatants continued f-bombing each other throughout the perfect, balmy afternoon at The Old Lady in The Pines, showing first-year Tar Heels and Blue Devils the intensity of this rivalry even when there is little at stake beyond pride and fourth-tier bowl bids.
Duke led 17-10 at the half and extended it to 24-10 early in the third quarter before Carolina took over the game — scoring 15 points that began with a Shipp reception and his leaping two-point conversion catch from Lopez that cut the deficit to six points, 24-18. By then, Lopez was outplaying his more-publicized counterpart Darian Mensah, on his way to completing 12 of 14 passes in the second half. He drove the Heels 91 yards capitalized by Davion Gause’s 12-yard burst into the end zone. The two-point play had paid off, as Rece Verhoff’s PAT put the Heels up 25-24 with 13 minutes left in the game.
North Carolina wide receiver Jordan Shipp (1) celebrates his touchdown during the second half of UNC football’s game against Duke, Saturday, Nov. 22, 2025, in Chapel Hill, N.C. (Photo via AP Photo/Chris Seward)
The victory was at hand after Duke died on fourth down when Carolina’s Jaiden Patterson sacked Blue Devil receiver Que’Sean Brown while he was trying to complete a trick pass play back to Mensah. The Tar Heels took over — but Lopez was quickly sacked on second and third down for UNC’s only three-and-out drive of an otherwise offensive second half. Tom Maginness punted the ball away, and Duke began its decisive drive.
Mensah marched the Devils 50 yards to a fourth-and-three at the UNC 27. The field goal team came on to attempt a 43-yarder that would have given Duke the lead back. Perhaps the Tar Heel coaches should have known that Todd Pelino was only 6-for-11 on kicks of that length and been wary of a fake.
Instead, the defense pinched in from both sides to try to block or rattle the kick. Rather than placing the ball down, holder Kade Reynoldson flipped it back to Pelino, who raced untouched around the left end until linebacker Andrew Simpson knocked him out of bounds at the UNC 1-yard line with 2:20 left in the game. Smooth.
Duke kicker Todd Pelino, right, runs a fake field goal-attempt for a first down as North Carolina defensive end Smith Vilbert (8) pursues during the second half of an NCAA college football game Saturday, Nov. 22, 2025, in Chapel Hill, N.C. (Photo via AP Photo/Chris Seward.)
Belichick called a timeout, setting off speculation that he would let the Blue Devils score to leave enough time on the clock for Lopez to drive them down for a touchdown to tie or maybe win the game. Duke’s Andrew Castle dove across the goal line for his third TD of the day and, after a UNC unsportsmanlike penalty moved the ball to the 1-yard line, the Blue Devils converted a two-point conversion for the seven-point lead that would be the final score.
UNC’s last possession began with Miles McKay getting flagged for holding – Carolina’s 12th penalty of the day – and Lopez couldn’t dig out of the hole. The last chance ended on a long attempt to senior receiver Kobe Paysour, who had caught seven passes on the day to combine with Shipp’s eight.
The Dukies celebrated their second straight win over the Tar Heels, dragging the Victory Bell from their own sideline to midfield for all the Carolina fans to see and hear it clanging.
“What a game,” said Duke coach Manny Diaz. “We said it all week. Duke-Carolina comes down to the last play of the game, no matter how it looks through the first three quarters.
“There were times where it felt like we had control of the game, but credit to them. They made a fight back, which you would expect in a rivalry, and it felt like they took control of the game.
“In my mind,” Diaz said, “the key sequence in the game was when we got stopped on the fourth down. All the momentum was going their way and we hadn’t played great on defense in the second half. To go out there and get back-to-back sacks and get the three-and-out, it flipped the momentum.”
In the Carolina locker room, the sophomore Shipp talked about his relationship with Paysour, who played his last game in Kenan.
“I just went there and held Kobe,” he said. “I just love him, man, so that’s all you could do. I was not playing for myself. I wanted to win that for Kobe specifically. We just came up short, but Kobe balled out. A lot of our seniors balled out. They all made plays tonight. He made some great plays on the ball and everybody left it all out there. We were just a couple of plays away.”
On Shipp’s mindset after the rivalry loss:
“There is a lot of stuff we can harp on. There is a lot of stuff that we did well, a lot of stuff we did poorly. There is a lot of stuff we could have done better. My biggest thing is that I just want to get ready for State. That’s where my mind is now to put tonight behind us.”
On the season, which has not gone how many had hoped:
“I wouldn’t trade this season in for anything else. I wouldn’t trade the relationships that I’ve built with a lot of those guys. I would have never known Thad [Dixon] if we didn’t get Coach Belichick. All those West Coast guys that came in. I wouldn’t have known any of them. That’s just God bringing people together. I wouldn’t trade any of these guys for the world.”
Art Chansky is a veteran journalist who has written ten books, including best-sellers “Game Changers,” “Blue Bloods,” and “The Dean’s List.” He has contributed to WCHL for decades, having made his first appearance as a student in 1971. His “Sports Notebook” commentary airs daily on the 97.9 The Hill WCHL and his “Art’s Angle” opinion column runs weekly on Chapelboro.Chapelboro.com does not charge subscription fees, and you can directly support our efforts in local journalism here. Want more of what you see on Chapelboro? Let us bring free local news and community information to you by signing up for our newsletter.
