UNC football still plagued by penalties

Coach Larry Fedora stuttered for a second and cited a vague form of positive reinforcement as punishment.

Senior defensive tackle Ethan Farmer said sometimes it’s a matter of running a sprint or two — some sort of an updown.

But either way, with the regular season halfway over, it’s still unclear what punishment the North Carolina football team endures for penalties in practices and games.

And six games in, it shows.

The Tar Heels average 9.5 penalties for 78 yards each game, which is up from the first six games of 2013, despite Fedora making a preseason promise to cut the penalties in half.

In 2013, UNC averaged two fewer penalties and almost 15 fewer yards per game through the first half of the season, compared to the first half of 2014. To date, the Tar Heels rank 113th in the nation for total penalties and 116th for penalties per game, which has Fedora left wondering if what is learned in practice will carry over to a game for his 2-4 Tar Heels.

“You keep doing what we’re doing and you say, ‘Well, you keep doing what you’re doing, you’re going to get the same results,’” Fedora said at his weekly press conference Monday. “But I really believe in practice – we’re doing this the way they’re supposed to be done. We’ve just got to play smarter.”

While in the first half of the 2013 season, UNC only amassed double-digit penalties once — 11 against Virginia Tech — the team has picked up 10 or more three times already this season. Against Clemson, it tallied a season-high of 15 for 130 yards.

Fedora said he doesn’t mind the occasional pass interference if it prevents a touchdown, but he didn’t justify any other type of penalty.

“The false starts on offense, that’s inexcusable, really. To have three or four of those a game, there’s really no reason for that,” he said. “We’ve had at least one on special teams, I think, every week, I believe. We’ve got to do a much better job of that.”

Saturday, the Tar Heels will take on Georgia Tech — who, in addition to running a potent triple-option offense, has 21 penalties fewer on the season than UNC.

“This week in practice is going to be extremely tough for us,” Farmer said. “As a defense and as a defensive line, we know we have to fill our gaps very well. Everybody’s going to have a role that they’re going to have to play this week.”

Part of cutting down on the penalties, he said, is trust.

“You can’t really worry about the guy next to you,” he said. “Just knowing he’s going to do his job.”

But if all else fails, Farmer said there’s nothing to do but move on, accepting that penalties are an inherent part of football, though they’re an even bigger part of UNC’s game.

“The way you gotta look at it and the way you approach it is you’ve got to move on to the next play — the next series,” he said. “You can’t really worry about penalties in the game because it’s always going to happen.”

sports@dailytarheel.com