Sunday progress report: How well did UNC grade against Miami?
North Carolina’s 47-10 loss to Miami on Thursday on primetime television was one to forget. Here are the grades for UNC’s performance, position by position.
Quarterbacks: D-
It wasn’t a good day for either quarterback. Six turnovers will almost surely give the opposing team the game. Sophomore quarterback Chazz Surratt was 4-10 for 10 yards and three interceptions. Junior quarterback Nathan Elliott was 16-25 for 104 yards and had three fumbles.
But you can’t put all the blame on the quarterbacks. There were way too many third-and-long situations. The average third down distance for UNC was 10 1/2 yards. That’s tough for any quarterback.
Running backs: B
The running backs were a positive for the offense in this game. But when UNC fell behind in the first half, it did not run as much. Sophomore running back Michael Carter had seven carries for 82 yards in the first half, but did not have a single carry in the second half. Junior running back Antonio Williams had three carries for 19 yards in the first half, but had only one carry in the second half. Along with Surratt’s 78 rushing yards, UNC combined to run for 215 yards.
Wide receivers: C
Ten different players caught at least one pass on Thursday. However, none had more than 33 yards. The longest catch of the day went for 20 yards from junior wide receiver Anthony Ratliff-Williams. The quarterbacks didn’t do a great job of getting the ball to their playmakers. Sophomore wide receiver Dazz Newsome, who had 106 receiving yards against Pittsburgh last week, had two catches for -4 yards against Miami.
Offensive line: C-
The offensive line provided holes for the running backs early in the game, but it seemed as if the quarterbacks were under pressure all day. Miami had three sacks, and 14 tackles for loss. Miami was ranked No. 2 in total defense coming into the game, and averaged 10.5 tackles for loss per game. Miami’s defensive line was too much for UNC on Thursday.
Defensive line: C
There were good moments and there were bad moments. The good moments were the two sacks UNC had and the strip sack. The bad moments were stopping the run. The Hurricanes ran for 229 yards as a team on Thursday. However, UNC’s offense put the defense in bad positions at times with turnovers.
Linebackers: C
Senior linebacker Cole Holcomb, junior linebacker Jonathan Smith and junior linebacker Dominique Ross were fairly quiet. They combined for six tackles and one for a loss. The linebackers share the blame with the rest of the team in the failure to stop the run. UNC coach Larry Fedora said there were more missed tackles in this game than in previous games.
Defensive backs: B
The defensive backs came up with its first interception of the season on Thursday. Freshman defensive back Bryson Richardson came up with his first career interception in the second half, returning it for 19 yards. UNC failed to turn that interception into points. Miami freshman quarterback N’Kosi Perry was 8-12 for 125 yards, one touchdown and one interception.
Special teams: C+
UNC’s special teams was not bad, but it didn’t do anything special (no pun intended). Senior kicker Freeman Jones was 1-for-2 on field goals. Senior Punter Hunter Lent had two punts for 82 yards. Dazz Newsome had a few nice returns on kickoffs and punt returns.
Coaching: F
This was probably one of UNC’s worst coaching performances. On UNC’s first series, the decision to throw with Elliott on first down from Miami’s three yard line was questionable. Then UNC ran it with Elliott and lost two yards. Elliott then threw another incomplete pass on third down and was forced to settle for three points. UNC should have run the ball more with Antonio Williams and Carter early in the game. Those two have been unstoppable recently, especially Williams. Also rotating both Surratt and Elliott throughout the game did not work in the Tar Heels’ favor.
This story was originally published September 30, 2018 at 4:18 PM with the headline "Sunday progress report: How well did UNC grade against Miami?."