UNC football looks to bounce back against Clemson

CLEMSON, S.C. — By now Quinshad Davis is used to the trash talk. He’s no stranger to the doubters in his home state who tell him he should have stayed put and chosen to play football at South Carolina or Clemson.

After all, both did offer the Gaffney, S.C. native and now junior wide receiver on the North Carolina football team.

“I wasn’t a fan of either one,” he said. “I don’t dislike them, but I don’t like them as much as North Carolina.”

Tonight, when the Tar Heels travel to Death Valley to take on Clemson, Davis will have to prove why that’s the case.

And if the taunting he knows he will endure will be kept to a minimum, the Tar Heels will have to prove that they are a team capable of putting on a better performance than last week’s 70-41 loss to East Carolina — one of the worst losses in program history.

It starts with the defense, a group that has forced defensive coordinator Vic Koenning to simplify his approach and heavily lean on the fundamentals. It's something Koenning hasn't had to do to this extent since he was the head coach of Wyoming from 2000-2002.

“It’s been a long time, since I probably was at Wyoming that I had to work, try to coach all these little bitty details,” Koenning said Wednesday after practice. “Typically, you’ve got guys that just do these things and it’s not something that you have to try to fix everything.”

The glaring issue is missed tackles. Though the Tar Heels actually missed fewer against East Carolina than they did against San Diego State — against whom they missed 34 — the statistics still have Koenning a bit concerned, and rightfully so.

“We were missing tackles at a 30,40 percent clip,” he said. “There wasn’t any play where we didn’t have somebody there technically, we just weren’t able to tackle people in space.”

The work the defense has done this week in practice to remedy that issue will certainly be tested by Clemson’s offense tonight, led by true freshman quarterback Deshaun Watson.

Clemson coach Dabo Swinney announced that Watson, a versatile quarterback with good speed and a strong arm, will replace regular starter Cole Stoudt though the two will both see time against the Tar Heels. UNC is hopeful though that the true freshman Watson will be more prone to youthful mistakes.

Offensively, UNC is still trying to find a quarterback rhythm of its own in a system that incorporates both Marquise Williams and Mitch Trubisky.

Coach Larry Fedora has been inserting Trubisky into the game every week for the third series while Williams watches from the sidelines. Fedora is confident that it hasn’t messed up the offense’s flow, subbing them both in and out, but he’s also not sure that plan is a permanent one.

“Whether or not we continue that, I don’t know,” he said. “Every one of those situations was planned. It wasn’t , ‘Let’s throw him out there because of what’s happening in the game.’ It’s been a planned situation.”

The Tar Heels haven't defeated the Tigers at Clemson in more than a decade, since 2001, and Clemson leads the overall series 35-19-1.

As for Davis, he'd like to change that and contribute to win No. 20.

Through three games he has just nine receptions and a touchdown, a quiet stat line for the junior with a wealth of expectations as UNC’s most experienced receiver.

Tonight, with all of his family there to see him, Davis hopes to make some noise of his own amidst the 80,000 screaming fans that will surround him in orange. He was hoping to get between 30 and 40 tickets to cover all of his bases.

But more than anything, the South Carolina product is excited to be home.

“It’s always going to have an impact on me. It’s always a challenge going home. They’re looking for me to make plays and show up and if I don’t, I gotta hear that bad talk,” he said. “It’s always a challenge to go home, but it’s an exciting challenge.”

As for when both UNC and the state of South Carolina can expect that big play from Davis?

“It’s coming.”

sports@dailytarheel.com