North Carolina Tar Heels: Must Shore Up Run Defense
The North Carolina Tar Heels face another impressive run attack when they play the Pittsburgh Panthers this weekend.
For the past few years the North Carolina Tar Heels have been a spread offense team that depended on their quick strike offense to overwhelm its opposition by simply scoring too much. That development had come at the expense of the defense, and so the Tar Heels have had an interior weakness. That weakness was exploited ad nauseum by Baylor last year and Georgia in week one of the season.
If there is one team in the ACC Coastal that lives by a totally opposite strategy, that team would be Georgia Tech with its ball control option offense that usually succeeds by grinding on the opposition with long sustained drives and clock usage.
However if there was ANOTHER team in the ACC Coastal that followed a dissimilar strategy to the Tar Heels, that team would be Pittsburgh. Under Paul Chryst, Pitt became a power running team behind back James Conner. Chryst may be gone to Wisconsin, but Pat Narduzzi is continuing the trend. Conner is back after a year battling cancer.
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Pitt stands as the most difficult challenge the Heels face to keep their division crown. Miami may be more talented, but Pitt does the things that the Tar Heels least want to see. The games against Pitt have been close and contested, and they have usually relied on some outside factor to bring success. There was the year that Ryan Switzer returned two punts for touchdowns, for example.
Conner is a beast on his own at 6’2” and 235 lbs. He is getting his game back together with 4.5 yards per carry against decent opposition in Penn State and Oklahoma State. He rushed for over a hundred yards in both games and found the end zone.
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The North Carolina defense on the other hand has a more checkered record. Georgia’s Nick Chubb had 222 yards (no more than 80 in the two games since), Illinois’ Ke’Shawn Vaughn had 115 yards (no more than 50 in the other two games, and James Madison’s Khalid Abdullah ran for 116 yards against the Tar Heels.
Conner is certainly more in the league of Chubb than he is in the other two. Not stopping him will mean a tired Tar Heel defense by the fourth quarter since the Tar Heel offense will not take the time to allow them to rest. Whatever the Tar Heel offense does, it will most likely do quickly.
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The Tar Heels must get their run defense figured out. After all, Pitt runs, Miami runs, and Georgia Tech runs. Oh and Florida State runs too. Check off the boxes against Pitt and the trip to wherever the ACC Championship Game is is back on.