CHAPEL HILL – Monday during football season means North Carolina Coach Mack Brown’s weekly press conference. And this week, Brown shared some extensive thoughts on how his team played in a win over NC State this past weekend while looking ahead to Saturday’s game at Virginia.
The Tar Heels routed the Wolfpack, 48-21, and now face 1-4 UVA at 8 pm in Charlottesville.
Here is Brown’s full press conference plus some notes and pulled quotes from what he had to say:
*UNC played 66 players in Saturday’s win over the Wolfpack. In addition, the Tar Heels had two 100-yard backs, a 100-yard receiver and 200-yard passer in the same game for just the second time ever, with the only other time a 59-42 win over Maryland in 1993.
*Brown has consistently talked about the need to build depth, so with senior CB Patrice Rene and senior WR Beau Corrales out for the NC State game, the staff had a chance to do that getting Ladaeson Hollins and Emery Simmons extended reps.
Hollins been on the field for just four defensive snaps all season before the State game but played 46 versus the Wolfpack. He played 287 last year, being thrust into duty in the middle of the season then as well. In both situations he played well, registering three tackles and a pair of PBUs.
Simmons had played just eight snaps on offense before Saturday, but he was on the field for 63 plays and ended up with five receptions for 38 yards.
“The fact that we had Beau Corrales out and Patrice Rene out and Emery Simmons and Dae Dae Hollins stepped up shows that we're making progress in our program as well,” Brown said. “Both of those guys played really well and you've got to have guys, with COVID and with injuries, you've put yourself in a position where you can get yourself in trouble for sure.”
*Special teams were better Saturday versus the Wolfpack, but still had some snags. It was good enough the team can build on.
“Special teams, it's the best we've played,” Brown said. “Jonathan Kim has been amazing kicking the ball out on the kickoffs. It's been near automatic. Kickoff return on the onside kick, we covered the ball and did a good job at that point, which led to points. The punt return, we had a plus-eight return, but there's some others there, we're so close.
“We've got to get Dazz (Newsome) open in the wide-open field with our punt returns. Grayson Atkins missed the 22-yard field goal, but he came back and had the 40-yarder right before the half and had a long one at the end of the game, the 34-yarder, and we actually kicked that just to have him continue to gain confidence because we're gonna need his kicks as we go through.”
*Brown hit on something some fans have asked about, and it has to do with time management late in the first half. So, the coach decided to explain the staff’s thought process in those situations.
"Time management changed when the Butch Davis, North Carolina-Tennessee play happened in the Music City Bowl and you get a 10-second runoff,” Brown explained. “So, you have to keep a timeout in your pocket as a head coach, so you really have two per half, you don't have three. Because, if you don't have a timeout and you have a 10-second runoff and you've got nine seconds left to kick a field goal to win the game, the game's over.
“So, number one, you've got two timeouts instead of three and then you have to make a decision: do you want to use the clock play or let 10 or 20 seconds runoff? And those are decisions you have to make because you're going fast anyway and what I like to do is always keep my timeouts in the pocket. I like to have them because, if you have two timeouts at the end of the half, or even three with your 10-second runoff, then you've got a chance to do that. So, it really worked and gave us time at Florida State, we just didn't hit the passes, but we had time to score.
“And, the other night, we took it less than a minute, we took it down the field and had a chance to hit Michael Carter for the touchdown and we overthrew it with four seconds left and we kicked the field goal. So, that's just the difference between how time management used to work and the way it works now. Some people would say, 'Use your timeout, use it fast.' I don't like to do that. I'd rather hold them as long as we can and make sure we have them at the end."
*A year ago, the Tar Heels’ didn’t have a great touchdown ratio in the red zone, and especially had issues rushing the ball into the end zone. But the latter part has changed this season. Carolina had scored on 19 of its 22 trips into the red zone, with 16 of the scores have been touchdowns, with 13 coming on the ground, more than they had all last season. The breakdown for running TD distances in the red zone so far: 1, 6, 6, 1, 1, 19, 6, 16, 1, 16, 10, 1 and 5.
“A huge, huge improvement of this team this year is we had five red-zone touchdowns in seven trips,” Brown said, referring to Saturday’s win. “And all five were runs. That’s something we weren’t doing well last year and was an emphasis for this year and we really, really feel good about that moving forward.”
*Seven true freshmen played on defense during the win over NC State, combining for 107 snaps. Now, this doesn’t include special teams, it’s just defense. The breakdown: Desmond Evans 25; Myles Murphy 24; Tony Grimes 15; Ja’Quarious Conley 13; Kaimon Rucker 12; Clyde Pinder 12; and Cameron Roseman-Sinclair 6.
So, what are Brown’s thoughts about how they played?
“Myles Murphy made some real physical plays up front,” Brown said. “There's one, if you go back and look at it and y'all have probably seen it, where he chases the ball all the way across the field and made the tackle himself at 300 something pounds, and he had a hurt hand. So, he had his hand in a ball and still made plays.
“Des Evans, he's 254 pounds now, he came in at 240, so every snap he takes he's getting better. He's rushing the passer better, but he sprinted like a dart coming out of a cannon to get on that fumble and that'll give him more confidence as he goes through.
“Clyde Pinder made a couple of athletic plays inside and Clyde hadn't really played any because he broke his hand early and didn't have a chance to play. Tony Grimes played 15 snaps outside of special teams. And we were playing off, so there were some balls that were thrown underneath him. But Tony, here's a high school senior, it still amazes me. I have to hit myself when I think about, 'C'mon Tony!' Well, he's a senior in high school, he shouldn't even be out there.”
*Carolina and Virginia will kick off at 8 pm at Scott Stadium in Charlottesville on Saturday night, and Brown noted in the presser that his team did not handle the late start in Tallahassee well, saying they must be better at it this week.
“Eight o'clock game, we didn't handle it well at Florida State,” Brown said. “We're getting up at 5:00 in the morning, we meet at 6:30, we practice from 8-10 every morning, so the 12 o'clock games work really, really well for us. Eight o'clock's late, so we're gonna have to handle that situation better this weekend than we handled it when we played against them earlier."
*The Wahoos are 1-4 but have a talented defense, though it comes in ranked No. 61 in the nation allowing 420 yards per game and No. 60 allowing 31.6 points per contest. The front seven is it’s strength, which includes monster defensive end Charles Snowden, and Brown focused on that challenge for the Tar Heels.
"Virginia's got great height,” Brown said. “(UVA Coach) Bronco's (Mendenhall) done a great job. What is he, 6-foot-7? You've got (Zane) Zandier at 6-3, 230, a middle linebacker that can really run. You've got Noah Turner, number seven, 6-5. You've got (Richard) Burney at 6-4 and then you've got (Charles) Snowden at outside linebacker at 6-7. So, they do a really good job of showing multiple defenses, getting their hands up and batting down a lot of balls."
*The Tar Heels have worn a different uniform look in each of their five games: Carolina blue helmets and jersey, white pants vs. Syracuse; Carolina blue helmet, white jersey and pants at BC; white helmet, navy jersey and white pants vs. Virginia Tech; Carolina blue helmet, white jersey and Carolina blue pants at FSU; and all Carolina blue versus NC State. So how are the uniforms they wear determined each week?
“That’s done by the leadership committee,” Brown said. “We have a 23-player leadership committee and they meet every Tuesday or Wednesday, and they decide which uniforms they’re going to wear. I have absolutely no input, don’t question what they want, I just want them to play good in whatever they wear. And I think they’ve already got them picked for the rest of the year.”
*Jacob Turner contributed to this report.
