With Saturday’s game against N.C. State rapidly approaching, the North Carolina football team is in the middle of preparing for a Wolfpack team that hasn’t won an ACC game this season. UNC is fresh off its first ACC win in Saturday’s 34-10 win against Boston College.
Dumbing it down
After the defense held Boston College to 261 yards of total offense on Saturday against Boston College, it might appear that the defense is making more tackles, but defensive coordinator Vic Koenning said that isn’t the case.
“I don’t know if I’ve seen that,” he said after practice Wednesday. “I saw missed tackles in the game. We haven’t done anything any different. Maybe it’s evening out or balancing out, or whatever. I wish I could say it’s some magic dust but it’s not been.”
Koenning said that at the beginning of the season he and the coaching staff tried to get defense to run more complex coverage, but they’ve realized over the course of the season that the Tar Heels simply can’t handle complicated schemes.
“We’ve had to really back off since probably early in the season because we realized they weren’t able to handle it,” Koenning said. “So we’re very, very, very simplistic, as much so as I’ve probably ever had a defense be. We’re trying to make sure we’re focusing on don’t having mistakes, trying to get them to play fast, trying to get them to play hard and taking away any excuses they may have for not doing that.”
Mystery quarterback
The Wolfpack will know ahead of time that North Carolina is likely to use both Bryn Renner and Marquise Williams on Saturday, but the Tar Heels don’t have the same luxury in preparing for N.C. State’s quarterback system.
Since breaking his foot in the first game of the season, quarterback Brandon Mitchell watched from the sidelines for five weeks until playing against Florida State Oct. 26. Mitchell completed 17 of 33 passes for 128 yards and threw two interceptions in the 49-17 loss.
“It’s still a mystery,” said coach Larry Fedora about N.C. State’s offensive scheme. “You don’t know. They’re all for doing something different. You don’t know who’s going to play and/or how healthy all of them are. So you don’t know all the details.”
Mitchell’s limited game appearances have made studying game film difficult, and there’s the chance that N.C. State coach Dave Doeren could put his other quarterback Pete Thomas to run a few plays, so the Tar Heels had to get creative in their preparation strategy.
“I tell you what we’ve analyzed every game this year — every quarterback, every formation,” Koenning said. “It’s almost mind-boggling the amount we watched. We’ve watched Wisconsin film from last year. Championship games, some other games. We’ve tried to exhaust every opportunity and avenue that we’ve had to research formations.
“It’s a bunch of stuff. As anybody that follows it knows, they run a bunch of different stuff. Different quarterbacks. It’s a lot. It’s too much for our players to consume.”
Marquise maturing
Since filling in for an injured Bryn Renner against Virginia Tech nearly a month ago, sophomore quarterback Marquise Williams has seen more time on the field, splitting reps with Renner.
Though he built a reputation as a running quarterback, Williams has gotten more comfortable throwing the ball and is a dual-threat on the field. Fedora has seen his backup quarterback grow in his game to the point that he’s not limiting the schemes Williams can run.
“We have not restricted him in any way,” Fedora said. “He still has some packages he’s in charge of but the entire game plan he’s running. Whatever we’ve got going in the game plan, he’s got.
“We weren’t taking advantage of everything he had to offer. That’s just what we were doing. Now, he has complete control of everything we do out there.”
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