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What’s wrong with Drake Maye? It’s the defense.
A famous basketball coach once said about opponents preparing to play his team, “We don’t want to take what they give us. We want to do what we want to do.”
That means finding a way to do that and executing, despite the defense.
Drake Maye is getting that from well-conceived game plans trying to keep him off the field and, when he’s on it, make it harder for him to get comfortable. The stats over Maye’s last six games, back to 2022, show that.
In his first 10 games as the Tar Heels’ QB1, Maye eclipsed 3,400 yards passing and had 34 TDs and only three interceptions. He had 13 TD passes in the last four, three in the ACC Coastal-clinching win at Wake Forest last November.
At that point, Maye officially entered the Heisman Trophy conversation. Since then, in the last four games of his red-shirt freshman year (all losses) and the first two wins of this season, he has had 6 touchdown passes, 3 in the last-second loss to Oregon in the Holiday Bowl. He’s also had six picks.
South Carolina held Maye in check for the first half, ending with Carolina ahead by three. No. 10 threw two TD passes in the third quarter to open up the game that the defense put away. As we know, he did not throw another against App State for only the third time in his so-far 16-game college career.
And Mack Brown said Monday that Minnesota, the opponent this Saturday at 3:30 in Kenan, depends on its defense, which held Eastern Michigan without a first down in the entire second half. “Never heard of that before,” he said.
The head coach knows that App gave up the run to hold down the chunk plays that Maye loves to throw. His 57-yarder to J.J. Jones was the only such play in the game and led to a missed field goal at the end of regulation.
“Drake did an unbelievable job with the 1-minute drive at the end,” Brown said. “I wish we’d made the kick, obviously, because the game should have been over. . . a 39-yard field goal right in front of the sticks.”
Brown was asked whether he will take what the defense gives him, even if it keeps Maye way under his Heisman Trophy hype.
“Drake’s wonderful and we only want to win, period,” he said. “A hundred percent, we’re not into any of the other stuff. Somebody asked Drake after the game, ‘What about you not throwing as much.’ He said, ‘I would’ve handed it to Omarion (Hampton), too. Nobody could stop him.’
“So it’s about winning games,” Brown said. “Drake’s totally about that.”
Featured image via Associated Press/Reinhold Matay
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I hate to be the proof-reading, fact-checking stickler here, Art, but the 57-yard pass to JJ Jones in the 4th quarter did not result in the missed FG at the end of regulation. The pass play in question occurred at the 10:44 mark in the 4th quarter and led to a 1st and goal from the APP 7-yard line which was punched in on the subsequent play by Hampton for a 27-24 UNC lead. This information is easily found in the play-by-play notes from the game.
Drake is a dadgum good quarterback, and Hampton and the other running backs that never play are pretty dadgum good too. We have a defense that shines at times, like me in my 6th grade class that it only took me 18 years to graduate from.
But we have Mack who hasn’t made a good game decision since me and Jethrine were chasing possums up Possum Ridge.
But Mack did give me some good investment advice which proves he’s not too old. He said invest in the telegraph machine and bag phones.