North Carolina Tar Heels: Chances Dwindling for Coastal Crown
The North Carolina Tar Heels saw their best chance disappear when Pitt failed to upend the Hokies.
The North Carolina Tar Heels may have been on bye this week, but that does not mean that their fortunes were put on hold while they rested. No, this not about the losses of their three regional rivals. If Duke simply doesn’t have it yet, or Wake Forest decides it wants to wait for bowl eligibility, or State lays an egg versus Boston College does not affect the Heels.
However there was a game on Thursday night that did. That was the Virginia Tech Hokies outduelling the Pitt Panthers and maintaining their number one spot in the Coastal. The Hokies have the tiebreaker over the Heels, so the Heels need them to stumble again this season, like they did to Syracuse.
The likelihood of that has much diminished. Miami and Pitt were supposed to be the checks on the Hokies’ luck of getting a rain date against the Heels. They have failed. The teams that are left to contend with Tech are Virginia, Duke, and Georgia Tech. The Hokies also play Notre Dame out of conference.
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Duke is the first and perhaps best shot to beat Virginia Tech. The Blue Devils have pulled surprises before and at least they get the Hokies at home instead of at Lane Stadium. It is hard to imagine Duke lighting up the Hokies with offense. It is much easier to see the Hokies grounding down the Blue Devils.
The Yellow Jackets will be playing their first game against Coach Justin Fuente. Is there a chance that Fuente would yield to the triple option? Perhaps, but Bud Foster still runs the defense and knows the deal. Fuente came from a league that has Navy in it, so the option is no stranger to him either.
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That leaves Virginia. They will be playing on the road at the end of the season. The one bright spot about the Cavaliers is their use of an aerial attack not dissimilar from Syracuse’s. It’s possible that the Hokies could get caught napping if the Cavs drop a couple more games going into that one.
The most likely outcome though is for North Carolina to get shut out of the ACC Championship Game. That would send them back to the ACC’s mid tier of bowls. Jerry Palm of CBS Sports currently has them slated for the TaxSlayer.com Bowl (formerly Gator) in Jacksonville.