Week 13: UNC @ Maryland

I-85/95 North coming from North Carolina into Virginia is a dark, long, depressing stretch of road void of seemingly all life or anything worth living for. That was my Thursday night, driving through the rain, trying to dodge the notorious Highway Patrol that has claimed the driving records of so many of my friends. Fortunately, I was not pulled over for speeding. Unfortunately, all momentum UNC had was brought to a dead stop on this road trip. I remember intently listening to the VT-Miami game, flying on a hope and a prayer that the Hurricanes could pull it out. I remember the long, dark, lonely trip seeming like the time of my life when Tech was stopped on 4th down to end the game. I remember how excited I was that UNC was in the driver’s seat. Just get past Maryland and we are in great shape. Just pull this one out. C’mon guys.


Fast forward about 48 hours and I’m in a parking lot in College Park with 4 college buddies. Surrounded by red-clad Maryland fans that all gave us the stink eye as soon as we get out of the car. All in all they were actually pretty nice to us. I had heard horror stories about Terp fans in the past, but those were mostly coming from Cole Field House when they were playing Duke, can’t say I really blame them. So we did the typical North Carolina kill ‘em with kindness thing and we were all playing flip-cup together before you knew it. It’s amazing what 12 beers can do.


My memories of the day then go something like this: Flip cup…damn it’s windy….rain drops….HEAVY RAIN DROPS…walking to the stadium…some fan talking shit…”screw you, Maryland is completely mediocre at every sport”…big stupid turtle shrine thing, might as well touch it…in our seats…kickoff. The football experience at Byrd Stadium can be summed up in two words: it sucks. Sure it was raining and only 48,000 showed up. But nothing about the stadium itself is appealing…at all. It’s got a very shoebox feel to it. Its almost like the equivalent of one of those “cookie-cutter” baseball stadiums, go to Tuner Field in Atlanta and you’ll know exactly what im talking about. They also don’t really do anything at all to make it an enjoyable experience for the fans. I’m talking about the presentation of the game, everything from the PA announcer to what they play on the speakers on 3rd down and so on and so forth. Sometimes this can be done very well and send goosebumps, sometimes very poorly and comes off as just stupid, but when it’s obvious that they just mail it in it kinda takes away from the whole experience.


We were good and sloshed when we took our seats and when I saw that snap go over the Maryland punters head I screamed like hell. Little did I know this was going to turn into one of the most sobering football games of the season. Basically, this was the fucking UVa game all over again, except it was raining. Look, a lot of the blame will go on Cam for this, and he wasn’t good, at all. But you also have to look at out O line only able to get 75 rushing yards, some awful drops by UNC receivers (namely Greg Little) and a missed 28 yard field goal. Some of this should go on John Shoop, like the inexplicable three pass plays after Maryland fumbled on the 38 yard line in the 3rd quarter. It was like the UVa game all over again in that UNC had opportunities to blow it open, and the defense played great, but UNC missed on them time and time again, and Maryland capitalized on their only chance.


So Sunday I found myself driving back down I-95/85 haphazardly listening to the Panthers game thinking about what could have been. As far as aftermath things go, everyone knows we blew this one. We blew the best shot we had to win the Coastal, by 2 pts. Now we have to regroup for a showdown with a now motivated NCSU team (damn you Wake!) and the planets pretty much need to align to win the coastal. People are upset but they need to chill, remember that this is only the 2nd season under Butch Davis and we have a shot at 9-3. Win two more games and maybe a Peach Bowl birth is in order. Who can’t smile at that? These next two games, these last two games, are about pride, as they always are. C’mon Heels.