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After one week, UNC could be in the driver’s seat to play for the ACC championship.
The Tar Heels unveiled perhaps the best Carolina team since 2015 with a dominating second half to beat South Carolina at the Mayo Kickoff Classic in Charlotte, site of that said conference title match on December 2.
It wasn’t a league game, of course, but it was against a bitter rival that embarrassed the Heels the last time they played in the same stadium to end the 2021 season. So they had something to play for, and boy do they ever now.
Forty-eight hours later, Carolina caught an enormous break when Duke proved luckier, if not better, than Clemson on Monday night at the old horseshoe in Durham, a game Dabo Swinney called the strangest he’s ever been in. The Tigers rushed for 200 yards and passed for 200 to snap a 58-0 record in Swinney’s 15 years as a head coach and a 108-0 school mark by losing with those offensive numbers. And they seemingly got blown out, 28-7.
Clemson was not as good as No. 9 in the country, and Duke was clearly as good or maybe better than the 9-4 team of last season. The Blue Devils did block two chip-shot field goals and force two turnovers at their own 1-yard line.
Whatever happens from here, Clemson will never get that loss back and has to win out in its next seven ACC games, likely having to beat the Heels in Death Valley on November 18 to finish first or second and make it to Charlotte.
Of course, the schedule Mack Brown complained about last spring is quirky enough to create the chance of Clemson and Carolina playing again two weeks later for the ACC title. The Heels right now have the better shot to get there.
And Brown’s 17th-ranked team has two home games coming up that he said were among the toughest first four he has ever had at both UNC and Texas, where he has now won 100 games at each, which is unprecedented.
The Heels had plenty of motivation for the Gamecocks in the opener, avenging the dismal 38-21 defeat to them the last time they played and also spitting out the taste of four straight losses to end last season. As of today, the Heels have an enticing path to finish first or second in the ACC and return to Charlotte.
Now, they face always-dangerous App State, which scored 40 on them in the fourth quarter last season before losing 63-61 in Boone. Brown kept a promise to dance with his team in the locker room if they won, and the Mountaineers saw the video on YouTube along with the rest of the sports world.
It’s the third of a three-game series, tied at one apiece. “I’ll be glad if we never play ’em again,” Brown said.
Featured image via Associated Press/Erik Verduzco
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Heck with the NCAA. Play Tez anyway. Play hard and beat App and take the forfeit. The college nation would go crazy!