Can underdog Carolina upset overrated Miami Thursday night?

Several factors give the Tar Heels a reasonable chance of knocking out No. 16 Miami, which is an exceedingly soft 3-1 so far this season with wins over Savannah State, Toledo and Butch Davis’ FIorida International.

The first of which is playing the Hurricanes more than 30 minutes from their campus always negates most of the U’s home-field advantage. UNC has won there two of the last three times, although this year may not have enough firepower to do it against the always-athletic Canes.

However, the Heels will get most of the suspended players from Shoe-Gate back a game early, thanks to the cancellation against Central Florida, in essence, counting as one of the games in the NCAA’s percentage metric. Quarterback Chazz Surratt is one of the banned players who will be back in uniform, but is unlikely to play unless Nathan Elliott follows up his career performance against Pitt with a poor start.

Of course, the entire ACC has proven to be bunched in the middle of the bubble that holds up third-ranked Clemson, the only true power in its Power 5 conference. The Tigers have obviously quit worrying about winning a fourth straight ACC championship by announcing that freshman dart-thrower Trevor Lawrence will replace Kelly Bryant at quarterback — despite Bryant having a 16-2 record as a starter. Dabo Swinney must be worried about keeping up with the Alabama’s and Georgia’s, which have made similar moves.

So with Duke ranked, BC, Syracuse, Virginia and Carolina all 1-0 in ACC play, and Florida State 0-2, Virginia Tech losing to a fourth-quarter blitzkrieg at Old Dominion and Miami getting embarrassed by LSU don’t make the league look much more than mediocre in the middle. In other words, almost anything can happen on any given game day.

The Tar Heels certainly need to spring an upset to keep their Coastal Division record clean and not lose a realistic chance at a bowl bid, and their surprising performance against Pitt and the ACC’s relative parity beneath Clemson makes winning this week possible, now, doesn’t it?

At the very least, the Miami game should be worth watching without having to cover our eyes.

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