One more test.
One more test for the North Carolina football team to prove it has arrived — no longer a plucky upstart or a team floundering under the sudden weight of expectations after years of losing. One more chance to firmly declare that the Tar Heels are here, they are real and they are to be taken seriously.
They just need to beat a top-10 team for the first time in 16 years.
"We're getting better in every area. The question is, are we ready to beat a top-10 team or not? We thought we might be against Notre Dame, we weren't," UNC head coach Mack Brown said during a press conference on Monday. "So Miami's playing as good as Notre Dame now — they've improved so much from last year, they've improved so much since their Clemson game, it doesn't even look like the same team."
Last year's win against Miami was the announcement to the world that North Carolina football might be real. Bad losses and an up-and-down season followed, and the win looked less impressive in hindsight as the Hurricanes faltered for the rest of the season.
This year, Miami has returned to form, sitting at third in the ACC behind perennial College Football Playoff threat Clemson and newcomer Notre Dame — if it weren't for the COVID-19-adjusted schedule and conference, the Hurricanes would be planning their trip to the ACC Championship game right now.
With the Tar Heels set to face off against Miami on Saturday, a win would go a long way to positioning North Carolina as a team that truly has arrived on the national stage. The Tar Heels took the first step last year, reclaiming an above .500 record, and followed it up this year with wins over ranked opponents (No. 19 Virginia Tech and No. 23 N.C. State), but as Brown said, they need a win over a top-10 opponent.
"The process and building a program, or rebuilding a program, is first you got to win at home," Brown said. "And then people say, 'Well, you can't win on the road.' Then you got to win on the road. And then next they say 'you can't beat a top-25 team.' Well, you got to do that. Then the next thing is they said, 'Well, you can't beat a top-10 team.' Yep, well, then you got to do that. And then you got to win the championship. So you've gotta win all the games. And until you do that people are never happy."
The Tar Heels, much like their Saturday opponent, are improved from last year, already reaching the seven wins they accrued in 2019 with one less game scheduled. The defense is still suspect at times and has been hurt by an attrition of players' injuries, but the red zone offense, one of the few places that needed improvement, has mostly been shored up.
