Art’s Angle: Kissing Your Sister

About 30 or so years ago, Dean Smith was asked about the prospect of another meeting against an ACC rival in the NCAA Tournament after having split two games during the regular season and losing a third that went into overtime.

“Should be a pretty even,” Smith snickered, “we each won once and the third game ended in a tie.”

So, following the wisdom of Dean, the Tar Heels’ record at this point of the football season is really 3-3-1. Or following perhaps less wise words after his team tied UNC in Kenan Stadium in 1979 when overtime had yet to be introduced into college football, East Carolina coach Pat Dye said something like he was happy heading back to Greenville and kissing his sister.

Saturday’s six overtime loss at Virginia Tech had so many good plays (mostly in regulation) and so many bad plays (mostly in overtime), plus some really poor optics over the four-hour telecast, that it is difficult to put the 43-41 final into the loss column. Both teams deserved a tie, nothing more and nothing less.

The Hokies’ Homecoming win put them back in the ACC Coastal race at 2-2 and gives them the tiebreaker over the Tar Heels (also 2-2). The division is turning into one of those good news (“You won the Coastal”) and bad news (“You have to play Clemson in the championship game”) jokes.

Frankly, no team in the division stands a chance against the third-ranked Tigers by the time its beat-up squad reaches Charlotte. More frankly, UNC would be better off merely getting to six wins and a bowl in Mack Brown’s return to coaching and Carolina; better to skip what would be an ugly rematch and another big story with Clemson.

No matter what he does, Brown can’t avoid the national spotlight, such as playing in the ACC’s longest game ever and the first in college football to test the new rule of having to try two-point conversions after the fourth overtime.

The TV cameras were all over Mack on the sideline in Blacksburg, whether cheering good fortune for his team or discussing what to do next with offensive coordinator Phil Longo. So, despite dropping to 3-4 on the season, the Tar Heels are still national news.

Freshman quarterback Sam Howell, Mack’s prize mentee, had five more touchdown passes that broke the Carolina freshman record (20 and counting). Entering the game with a sore left shoulder, Howell took repeated hits while trying to avoid the rush or keeping the ball on the option. With no healthy backup waiting in the wings, Howell has to keep playing and represents the Tar Heels’ best chance to win.

This was a game that had a little of everything, including blown defensive coverages that led to each team’s first and last touchdowns in regulation.

Howell hit a wide-open Dazz Newsome on the third play from scrimmage for 47 yards and a 7-0 lead. Virginia Tech got on the scoreboard when quarterback Hendon Hooker (the first of three QBs to play for the Hokies) found Tre Turner who had slipped past UNC’s young secondary for a 55-yard touchdown.

Thirty-one points and three hours later, Carolina’s flea-flicker (Howell to Michael Carter to Newsome back to Howell) wound up in the hands of uncovered sophomore Antoine Green for his first college touchdown and a 31-24 lead. Green, who had dropped a pass earlier and saw more snaps after Dyami Brown went out with an injury, had been completely ignored by Virginia Tech defenders.

But the Tar Heels allowed the tying touchdown 40 seconds later when Quincy Patterson (remember that name) bolted off right tackle for 53 yards to the house. A 6-foot-4, 250-pound version of Tim Tebow, Patterson probably won the starting job after he ended the madness by scoring the winning two-point conversion.

Over time, the game deteriorated into two teams trying to score in the restricted red zone and both coaches calling timeouts to ice the opposing kicker. That is an overtime rule – no TOs before a field goal attempt – that college football would be well-served to put in.

Both teams used every timeout they had, including one UNC called when its own kicker Noah Ruggles was getting ready to win the game. Brown seemed to be apologizing to Ruggles before Hokies’ coach Justin Fuentes used his timeout to give the Carolina sophomore kicker even more time to think about it. Ruggles barely missed wide right.

In all, there were 24 plays run in the red zone while the score remained 41-41, including three failed two-point conversions in the fifth and sixth overtimes. Mercifully, Patterson bulled his way in to end the first college game played under the new rules.

May it be the last.

The bitterly disappointed Tar Heels should be able to recover with Duke coming to Kenan Stadium for their Homecoming game. At the same time, on the real ACC Network channel, the Blue Devils were getting hammered at Virginia 48-14 by the now first-place Coastal Cavaliers.

This happens to be the 30-year anniversary of the 1989 ACC championship shared by Duke and Virginia before Florida State and five football teams from the old Big East joined the conference.

Not surprisingly, a team not named Clemson from the original ACC hasn’t won the league’s football title more than once since. That’s another reason making the trip to Charlotte this December may not be the best thing for whoever wins the Coastal.

We now know that whatever a Hall of Famer’s program, which has played six out of seven games decided by six points or less, does will get covered, big time. Whether worthy of it or not.