UNC's dream start becomes Friday the 13th nightmare as Heels can't escape Wake Forest

WINSTON-SALEM — After a dream start to North Carolina’s season ran into a Friday the 13 nightmare, the Tar Heels almost escaped again in another thrilling ending.

This time, it wasn’t to be, as the grim reaper, clad in all-black, caught up as Wake Forest held on for a 24-18 victory at BB&T Field in a game befitting of being played under a full moon.

Final Stats

This one was a slasher from the start with the Deacons bludgeoning the Tar Heels out of the gate, jumping out to a 21-0 lead with a 304-71 yardage advantage.

“You gotta tip your hat to them,” defensive tackle Aaron Crawford said. “They came out ready to play and they whooped our ass in the first half.”

It wasn’t a fair fight, as Wake Forest looked like the confident, mature team under sixth-year coach Dave Clawson while Carolina resembled a program still picking up the pieces under a brand new coach.

“I didn’t think we were as ready to go as we needed to,” Carolina coach Mack Brown said.

The picture of poise in leading two fourth-quarter comebacks in his first career starts, Sam Howell was out of sorts in the first half, completing 5 of 10 attempts for 15 yards while taking three sacks before being benched for Carolina’s final two possessions of the half.

“It was 100 percent on me,” Howell said. “Everybody on the offense was playing their ass off and I’ve just got to do a better job.”

At halftime, Carolina faced a choice as to whether they’d continue running scared or try to fight their way out of Winston-Salem — a choice that could be a step in revealing the culture change the Tar Heels are undergoing under Brown and his new staff.

“Everybody was pretty calm,” linebacker Jeremiah Gemmel said. “We knew what we had to do and we knew we had to come out with more energy…”

That energy led to a few more completions, a little more attention to detail and one gift of a turnover from Wake Forest quarterback Jamie Newman, who overthrew a receiver right into the arms of Myles Dorn.

“We always believed we were going to win the game,” Howell said.

A third-quarter field goal inspired a little more hope.

A 55-yard catch and run for Dyami Brown set up Michael Carter’s touchdown run, and with 6:09 to go, Brown’s 17-yard touchdown cut Wake Forest’s lead to 21-18.

Howell had done it again, completing 12 of 18 passing attempts in the second half for 167 yards and two touchdowns.

“For him to struggle like he did and for him to pick people up and come back and have a chance to win the game, that’s a real credit to him,” Brown said.

Ultimately, a Wake Forest field goal and a wacky final drive did Carolina in, as Carter took a handoff with ample time to set up a Hail Mary if he’d gotten out of bounds, but instead, he waited for a convoy of blockers and was ruled to have gotten out of bounds after time expired.

“I kind of slowed down to try to set the blocks up and if I would have just ran straight out of bounds, we probably would have had like three seconds left,” Carter said, “but I thought it was going to be the last play of the game and that was a mental error by me.”

A bizarre ending for a game that had two distinct plots.

Early, it appeared there’d be no positives in a destruction that spared no one in Carolina Blue.

Late the Tar Heels learned plenty about themselves fighting back to outgain the Deacons 262-132 in the second half and widening their fourth-quarter scoring margin to 38-9 on the season.

Perhaps most importantly, Carolina learned that you can’t always outrun the nightmare if you keep tempting fate.

“This game felt a lot like last year, in terms of we’re hanging on late, we’re fighting,” Crawford said. “For the last few years, one thing I’ll say is we never quit, ever.

“We’re a great fourth quarter team, but for us to be a great all-around team we need to do it every down, every snap, every quarter and string it all together.”

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