5 Questions With Wake Forest

THI caught up with Deacons Illustrated writer Kelly Quinlan to learn more about North Carolina’s opponent this week, Wake Forest. The Tar Heels travel to Winston-Salem for a 6 pm kick Friday night.

Wake is 2-0 with a home win over Utah State and a victory at Rice.

Here are 5 Questions about Wake Forest:

Wake has three outstanding receivers with Sage Surratt, Scotty Washington and Kendall Hinton, though Hinton will not play in this game, so how does that affect the Deacons' passing game?

Losing Hinton hurts because he really stepped into that void left by Greg Dortch leaving early for the NFL. However, in the first two games the two outside receivers Washington and Surratt have been the main focus. Washington had some issues with drops in the Utah State game, but was the ACC receiver of the week this week for his performance against Rice. Surratt is one of the most talented receivers and athletes to come out of the state of North Carolina in the last couple of years. Both are long, tall and fast enough to put a ton of pressure on corners.

Without Hinton, I expect to see a little more action to the tight ends and running backs in the passing game. In that slot spot Isaiah Isaac saw action against Rice and the Deacs are listing Jaquarii Robinson who backed up Dortch last year some. He has a good amount of reps under his belt while Isaac is just a redshirt freshman.

While Wake’s passing game gets a lot of attention, the Deacons have run the ball 19 more times than it’s passed it this season. Why has the Deacs’ ground game been effective through the first two games?

I think the numbers got a little skewed by Kenneth Walker III 96-yard touchdown last week. If you take that out of the mix, they are averaging just 3.1 yards per carry. The Rice game got out of hand and they ran it some as well. Cade Carney didn't play last week against Rice with an injury and he has battled some injury bugs throughout his career because of how hard he runs. He takes a pounding. The other reason they are running a little more is quarterback Jamie Newman is a little more mobile and has that element to his game where he can run well enough to pick up key yards when teams drop into heavier coverage or over pursue.

The Demon Deacons haven’t exactly been stout defensively through two games, even Rice moved the ball at times after its starting QB went down last week. What is the primary strength of this unit and what is the primary weakness?

I think the cornerbacks have a lot of talent and the defensive line and linebacker Justin Strnad have turnout to be better than advertised. The defensive line got after Rice last week and they have a lot of young guys in the mix playing major snaps along with stalwart Boogie Basham who is a one-man wrecking crew. Amari Henderson hasn't played his best ball early at corner and has been picked on, while Essang Bassey is one of the best cover corners in the ACC. The safety play has been up and down as has the linebacker play aside from Strnad who is off to a great start.

This meeting actually doesn’t count in the ACC standings and the schools decided to play a home-and-home because they rarely play now that they’re in different divisions. Does that have Wake fans amped up even more to have the Tar Heels visiting?

Yeah, I think a lot of people miss these classic games. It is a shame that you don't get to see Wake-UNC or Duke-NC State all the time anymore. The Wake faithful like these games better than playing a random P5 team like Northwestern or Rutgers or something of that caliber. Given how ties run so deep in North Carolina among families, it makes for a more interesting game playing a school that everyone has connections good or bad to. I think it is great that they decided to mix it up and not wait the full rotation to play.

What is your prediction for the final score and why?

So this is hard because North Carolina played two average P5 teams and won close games while Wake played an above average G5 team and a bad G5 in Utah State and Rice in their first two games. I feel like this may be a defense optional game and I think we see a big number on the scoreboard. I'll give a slight edge to Wake at home 38-35, but you could flip that easily. The hard part about the early season games like this is that it is harder to handicap it because you can't tell who stinks and who is for real. The Tar Heels looked much better in their first two games so that will be interesting in a true road game.