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Is Carolina overthinking its loss to Virginia?
Members of the media who attend Mack Brown’s weekly press conference agree that he was more informative Monday than usual after his team suffered its first defeat of a now 6-1 season.
He took the blame, of course. He’s done that more as his coaching seasons passed, this time saying he failed everyone from himself to the UNC administration and Tar Heel fans anywhere.
“As a young coach I probably couldn’t stand up there and say that,” Brown said. “But it’s true. I’m disappointed in me. And when you get disappointed, you get back up and you go to work. Try to take a negative and turn into a positive.”
One of Brown’s favorite sayings is, “Don’t let one loss turn into two.”
This week will be extremely challenging for his coaches and players because they have all said so much, maybe too much, about their first loss. Brown says they are practicing harder than ever, trying to get rid of the bad taste.
By now, they have focused their full attention on Georgia Tech, which began UNC’s four-game slide to end last season by rallying from a 17-0 deficit in Kenan Stadium to secure the upset win when sure-handed Josh Downs dropped the winning touchdown in the front corner of the end zone.
Now, the Yellow Jackets have more than just their recent success over Carolina. They will likely tweak their own run-pass option to mirror what the Wahoos did in running up more total offense than all season.
Defensive coordinator Gene Chizik calls it “copy-catting” and Brown says they will surely “parrot” UVa’s success. So while Chizik’s defense will try to do a better job containing Georgia Tech’s new quarterback, Haynes King, and according to Brown the fastest receivers in the ACC, will all the talk help or hurt?
“They’re gonna sit and watch somebody else and they’re copycats,” Brown said. “So you’re gonna start seeing what happened at the end of last year when Georgia Tech blitzed us so much and got to Drake, they were either blitzing or dropping eight, then we had three weeks of blitzing or dropping eight. That’s just what it was, and we didn’t handle it very well.
“We think we’ll have a better feel this week, but Tez is such a prominent factor now when he walks on the field, we probably won’t know till that first quarter how Georgia Tech’s gonna play us. And, it changes the entire look of your defense because they’re gonna try to get two around Tez.”
Sure, the preparing is necessary, the scouting and game planning and guess work involved. But, before what is a very crucial game for his team, it brings to mind another of Brown’s favorites: “Just go play!”
Hopefully, the Heels won’t come out with a hangover and will do just that.
Featured image via Associated Press/Chris Seward
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