UNC’s defense recorded a season-high nine sacks and held off a late Stanford rally to beat the Cardinal 20-15 at Kenan Stadium Saturday night. It’s Carolina’s second straight win.
“It’s good to win. Good to win at home,” head coach Bill Belichick said afterward. “Proud of our team. It was an interesting two halves.”
Belichick was kind to describe the first half as “interesting.” The Tar Heel offense was stuck in neutral in the opening 30 minutes for the second straight game, managing only a field goal and fumbling at its own 30-yard line. Fortunately for UNC, the defense continued its strong run of play by limiting the Stanford offense to just three points of its own on a field goal as time expired in the second quarter. It was 3-3 at halftime, with the two teams combining for just 147 total yards of offense – 100 of which came from Stanford.
“We’ve just gotta get better,” said quarterback Gio Lopez. “It feels like everything is self-inflicted. I have a turnover, we’re not executing the run game as good as we should… we need to have a full four-quarter game, because that’s what we’ll need the next three weeks.”
As in the Syracuse game last week, the Carolina offense came alive in the second half. Lopez found running back Davion Gause from 20 yards out to cap off the Tar Heels’ opening drive of the third quarter for the night’s first touchdown. Rece Verhoff drilled his second field goal to extend the lead to 13-3 before UNC appeared to ice the game early in the fourth quarter. Lopez found an open Jordan Shipp down the field on third down, and Shipp ran past a stumbling Cardinal defender for a 55-yard touchdown, his longest career reception. UNC led 20-3 with 12:04 remaining.
“I saw Jordan one-on-one,” Lopez said. “We’ve repped that all week in practice, and I just trusted him, because he’s been getting open all week.”
“I trusted Gio,” said Shipp. “I knew he was gonna put the ball exactly where it needed to be… he threw it before I even got out of the break.”
With Carolina’s defense having not allowed a defensive touchdown for more than seven quarters to that point, it seemed the Tar Heels would coast to victory. But Stanford made UNC sweat, executing nine-play touchdown drives on each of its next two possessions. The Cardinal attempted two-point conversions and failed after each touchdown, leaving the score 20-15 in favor of Carolina with 1:47 to go. The Tar Heels ran 1:01 off the clock but could not achieve a first down, punting the ball back to Stanford with 46 seconds remaining.
With no timeouts left, the Cardinal’s desperation drive was effectively torpedoed by Melkart Abou-Jaoude, who brought down quarterback Elijah Brown for his third sack of the night. It was a fitting capper for the reigning ACC Defensive Lineman of the Week, who now has 10 sacks this season – the most by a Tar Heel since Kareem Martin recorded 11.5 in 2013.
Tyler Thompson joined in the fun, setting a new career high with three sacks of his own. It marked the first time in program history two different Tar Heels each recorded three sacks in the same game. As a team, Carolina notched a season-high nine sacks.
“I’m just happy we get to show you guys and everybody else the work that we’ve been putting in,” said linebacker Khmori House, who finished with a team-high 13 total tackles, a pass break-up and his first interception of the season. “And we’re gonna continue to do this.”
With the win, Carolina improves to 4-5 overall and 2-3 in ACC play. The Tar Heels will be back in action next weekend when they visit Wake Forest in Winston-Salem at 4:30 p.m.
Featured image via Associated Press/Chris Seward
Chapelboro.com does not charge subscription fees, and you can directly support our efforts in local journalism here. Want more of what you see on Chapelboro? Let us bring free local news and community information to you by signing up for our newsletter.
