as far as this year’s team, last year we lost 3 NFL players, one of which just today (nicks) broke open a ridiculous WR screen and took it to the house, on the NFL level…that makes a young defense and an inexperienced qb look REALLY good when you just throw it in the general area of WR’s and you’re practically guaranteed to score 21 points per game. Plus, with recruiting, the first step is get top recruits, so butch is going after top players to start and fill starting roles. I think that football being such a huge roster, it probably takes until the second cycle or recruiting (accompanied by some success) until we get experienced players that are top tier caliber as backups. Right now, 3 or 4 years into his recruiting/program building, we really just can’t afford to get hit w/ the types of injuries we’ve had. It’s really been the perfect storm: 3 18 year old receivers and one converted RB to receiver, a not so mobile QB, and one experience offensive lineman (jolly, any updates on his late game injury).

Watching the game was sad and yes i don’t think we can beat anyone unless we specifically game plan for the fact that the pocket lasts about 1 second and then the ball has to come out, utilizing draws, quick screens, and moving the pocket on bootlegs and rollouts. TJ had zero time to throw, and he’s not comfortable enough yet to take a beating all day and still deliver to guys he hasn’t even practiced with for an entire year. Draughn maybe could fall forward and hit holes a little bit better, but he’s a game changing running back, not a battle ram. If we went full time to Houston, we might move the chains a few more times, but it takes away the big play capability.

Look, i’m not a football expert, but no O-Line seems to be 100% of the problem and it’s not even the players faults, they’re getting thrown in a year or two before they’re ready, playing with new guys, and the rest of the team is suffering b/c of it. we can’t throw down field b/c there is hardly enough time, and we can’t pick up 3 or 4 yards on 1st and 2nd down to give us managable 3rd downs. thus we have to throw on 3rd and long and the defense is ready for it. then, when we inevitably don’t convert, our defense is asked yet again to get stops. against GT, it was excusable, but against UVA, it is not, but there were only a handful of times we didn’t punt from our 20 and give them the ball on their 40, forcing the D to hold them to 9 points (for most of the game) on short fields. Our defense is good, but they’re still a year away too from being dominant. so i don’t think it’s fair to say that they should not only get every single stop, but also score for us too. and i don’t think our D is good enough to get basically zero time of possession against a veteran GT team and think they should shut them out.

Hopefully the GA Southern game gives us some confidence boostage, people get healthy, and the coaches actually build a plan around our young and inexperienced o-line.

Mack Brown had us on the precipice, but Dick Baddour botched the process and Brown ended up at Texas.

That sounds like you think Baddour made Mack Brown decide to go to Texas. While I’d agree that Baddour “botched the process” after Mack Brown left, I’d assert that UNC could not have won a bidding war with Texas 12 years ago, and there was little chance Mack Brown was staying anyway.

Also, I think comparing Mack Brown to Butch Davis isn’t far off. Mack Brown was a great recruiter who could sell ice to Eskimos, but wasn’t the greatest sideline general. So far, that’s Butch Davis, IMO.

Spurrier and Holtz didn’t exactly do the waltz at South Carolina, a school with a similar historical level of success as UNC in football, but one that actually disdains its basketball tradition, which is far better, and hopes to be an SEC football power.

Maybe we can do it again, but is it sustainable? Michigan, one of the few to win titles in both sports, is not exactly up to standards in either sport right now. Florida maintained its football success, even after Spurrier left, but has struggled in basketball.

Top talent in math and physics go to Cal Tech and MIT and top talent in basketball go to UNC, Kentucky and Kansas. These are schools where the focus is on basketball in October. I am just not sure that your top recruits want to go to a school like Florida where the student body doesn’t even think about basketball until close to February.

Texas has done a nice job recruiting in both sports but I get the feeling that a lot of that is due to the sheer amount of oil money going into beautiful facilities. In terms of fan interest, people in Texas care more about spring practice than they do about their perennially good basketball team.

There are only two college championships that any one cares about and UNC won one of them this year. Run that by any of your coffee break colleagues.

Well, now, and I’ve always tried to be positive, can plainly see that the offensive scheme is so predictable that I was literally calling 2 out 3 plays and making the folks around me laugh. That’s all you could do on such an otherwise beautiful day in Kenan Stadium. Now, I’m a realist, and I know the OL is probably the root of the issue, but this performance was truly, the first game of the Davis era, that was Torbusesque and Buntingesque all rolled up into one. I don’t care if UVA has good athletes, they were beaten by WILLIAM and MARY.

Yates, I’m sure he’s a great kid, but he is not one cent better than his first day on the field as a FR. It’s time to challenge Mike Paulas, Hansen, Jamal Womble…….heck start the daggone FR o-liners. Teach Ryan Houston how to block and teach Shaughn Draughn how to gain 3 yards instead of losing 2. Teach Wilson and J Boyd how to finish a route.

I’m done. Still shaking head however. Oh yea, congrats to UVA. I 100% agree with Heeled soul.

I’m much more mad at Shoop than I am at Withers. Our offense must be the worst in D1 football.