Tar Heels’ defense gashed with big plays in upset loss to James Madison

UNC’s defense struggled again but this time they gave up 70 points to James Madison.

With the chance to go 4-0 ahead of their Atlantic Coast Conference schedule, the North Carolina Tar Heels were embarrassed at home to James Madison on Saturday. The Dukes jumped all over the Tar Heels early en route to a 70-50 win.

It got so bad that fans were leaving before halftime and the boo birds came out for the now 3-1 Tar Heels.

While UNC’s offense did put up over 40 points (they got a punt block for a touchdown), it was the defense that couldn’t stop anything. And big plays were the Kryptonite for the defense.

On the first play after the opening kickoff, quarterback Alonza Barnett III broke off a 37-yard run. That got the Dukes into field goal range where they took a 3-0 lead.

After UNC grabbed a brief 14-11 lead, it took the Dukes 32 seconds to respond as wide-open Omarion Dollison hauled in a 69-yard touchdown pass from Barnett III to give them the lead again. It wasn’t the only big play on the day either.

UNC’s secondary struggled with coverages throughout the game and it really felt like every play there was a wide-open receiver for a touchdown. The Dukes scored a few touchdowns by finding wide open receivers including the final one that gave them 70 points.

“You can’t change 70 points worth of stuff,” Brown said. “We just didn’t communicate. I don’t know why. I have no idea what happened and I saw there and watched it, I listened to it. We had guys in the wrong place. I thought after the first drive they got frustrated and started trying to do too much, and then they didn’t quit listening and busted assignments. I was very frustrated.”

Too many times throughout the day UNC’s defense looked confused with assignments and coverages, a sign of not being prepared as it’s day one stuff that is installed in the offseason.

The Dukes had nine plays of 17 or more yards on Saturday and seven plays go for 20 or more yards.  It was a disaster for UNC’s defense and there’s really no other way to put it.

With the ACC schedule beginning next week at Duke, the Tar Heels are now left searching for answers.

“We’ve just gotta figure out what happened on defense and why we were so bad and go back to work,” Brown said.

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