
{"id":13414,"date":"2010-10-28T12:30:53","date_gmt":"2010-10-28T20:30:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/?p=13414"},"modified":"2010-10-28T12:30:53","modified_gmt":"2010-10-28T20:30:53","slug":"heels-must-regain-the-emotional-edge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/2010\/10\/28\/heels-must-regain-the-emotional-edge\/","title":{"rendered":"Heels must regain the emotional edge"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Eddy Landreth<br \/>\n<\/strong><em>Staff Writer<\/em><\/p>\n<p>When Carolina fans thought about the 2010 football season back around Memorial Day, few would have imagined Saturday\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s 3:30 p.m. kickoff against William &#038; Mary could be called a critical game.<\/p>\n<p>Back when runners evoked images of who would carry the ball and tutors were not even a thought, this game appeared to be one UNC could get by on its talent. After a string of emotional games to open the season, the Tar Heels would not have to dip into its emotional reservoir for once, or so it seemed back then.<\/p>\n<p>Suspensions and injuries have shredded those thoughts, at least among the fans. Certainly, if the team hopes to win this game and stay in contention for a bowl bid, the players had better understand the critical nature of this week\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s game.<\/p>\n<p>The Tribe (6-1) is an elite team in what we used to call Division I-AA, the same classification as Appalachian State and Furman and Richmond. Teams from this category have defeated Division I-A schools through the years.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153If you don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t respect your opponent, I think it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the biggest trap in America,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Coach Butch Davis said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153That is why I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve always tried to make such a big deal that it really isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t about the opponent. It doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t matter who the other team is. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s more about how you play.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>What makes this game so important is that Carolina stands at 4-3 after losing 33-10 at Miami on Saturday.<\/p>\n<p>By the end of that game, injuries had cut the Tar Heels\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 depth in the secondary to the bone. Kids who would have been third-string contributors were on the field against Miami\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s first-string offense.<\/p>\n<p>Yet even before that happened, Carolina had problems stopping the run because of suspensions and the lack of recruiting at defensive tackle.<\/p>\n<p>Now UNC, quite simply, cannot afford to lose this game.<\/p>\n<p>A victory would leave UNC with four games to play, and it would need two wins to earn a third consecutive bowl bid, which would be a considerable accomplishment given the controversy and troubles this team has endured.<\/p>\n<p>Carolina has to regain some of the emotional edge and crispness of execution that helped it win four straight before losing at Miami.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153We had a meltdown on Saturday,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d safety Deunta Williams said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The biggest thing that I think was a factor was that they could turnaround and hand the ball off any time they wanted to. <\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I think we did a good job sometimes in controlling the run, when we lined up right. But we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve just got to man up and go play.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>No one should have been surprised that Carolina would lose its edge for one week. But one week is all it can afford.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153This group of kids and this football team has been remarkably resilient all year long, to deal with all the things that they have had to deal with,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Davis said.<\/p>\n<p>Resiliency will be among the qualities needed most at 3:30 on Saturday. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When Carolina fans thought about the 2010 football season back around Memorial Day, few would have imagined Saturday\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s 3:30 p.m. kickoff against William &#038; Mary could be called a critical game.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13414","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13414","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13414"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13414\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13416,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13414\/revisions\/13416"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13414"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13414"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13414"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}