Donning the powder blue of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, newly-minted Tar Heels’ Head Coach Bill Belichick’s first home game at the collegiate level could be spoiled by one team only.
Unfortunately for the University of Richmond football team, that team was not them. The Tar Heels defended their home turf Saturday, Sept. 13 and evaded what would have been a stunning upset defeating the Spiders 41-6 in front of more than fifty thousand spectators.
UR looked to be the first Football Championship Subdivision school since 2022 Southern Illinois University to upset a Power Four program. The Spiders opted for a run-heavy offensive scheme, but still faced an uphill battle, recording just three rushing yards on their first drive.
“We were concerned whether we could protect every time we dropped back,” UR Head Coach Russ Huesman said in a postgame press conference. “We wanted a shortened game, that’s the bottom line… we were gonna make sure they only got fifty plays and… they got fifty plays.”
It took the Tar Heels just seven plays to go up on the Spiders as they dominated the ground game, recording two incomplete passes, but gashing UR’s run defense for 58 yards. UNC drove down to the eight-yard-line before sputtering, a sack by sophomore defensive lineman Daniel Sellers and junior defensive lineman TJ Baldwin forcing the Tar Heels to punch in a short field goal.
Consecutive sacks on the Spiders’ next drive negated modest rush yardage, setting up a punt on 4th-and-16 and priming the Tar Heels for the first touchdown of the contest. En route to a 10-0 lead, UNC was stifled into a 4th-and-2 by the Spider defense, but a critical offside penalty and a fresh set of downs allowed the 29-yard score just a few plays later.
Pivoting to the passing game, the Spiders nonetheless found themselves in a 4th-and-5 situation after coming up with only five yards through the air. A four yard gain on the ensuing fake punt dug UR into a deeper hole, gifting UNC with possession at the 25-yard-line to open the second quarter with a field goal.
Scoring continued for the Tar Heels, who took a 20-3 lead into halftime off of an efficient 7-play touchdown drive. The Spiders’ response, a 25-yard field goal by graduate kicker Jayden Alsheskie, capped off their best drive of the day, covering 14 plays and 76 yards. Junior running backs Aziz-Foster Powell and Jamaal Brown helped to sustain the drive, supplying a combined 33 rush yards for UR.
The Spiders continued rolling out of halftime, melting six minutes off the clock with small ground gains. A 28-yard pass from senior quarterback Kyle Wickersham to sophomore wide receiver Isaiah Dawson set the Spiders up at the 8-yard-line, threatening a UR touchdown to make it 20-10. However, four straight rushes yielded only seven yards as the Tar Heels came up with a critical stop.
From there, the game quickly grew out of reach for the Spiders. Back-to-back offensive touchdowns for UNC bookended a 62-yard fumble return defensive score. The Spiders’ 41-3 hole nearly worsened with an interception midway through the fourth quarter, but senior defensive back Jordan Allen snatched possession right back for the Spiders with an interception of his own.
Alsheskie would knock in one more field goal for the Spiders before time expired, this one from 28 yards and once again set up by Foster-Powell and first-year running back Michael Creamer. With the contest long since decided however, it did little to derail UNC’s first home victory.
“We’ll see how much we take away after we watch the film, but I thought our guys played hard,” Huesman said. “We played hard [on] both sides of the ball; we didn’t play as smart as I would like, but we did play hard.”
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UNC picked up its second straight victory with the win, posting a 2-1 record on the season.
The loss marked UR’s fourth straight season beginning 1-2. In each of the previous seasons, the Spiders have gone on to finish 9-4 or better. UR will look to begin the climb back at home against Virginia Military Institute Sept. 20 at 2 p.m.
Contact sports editor Scott Valentine at scott.valentine@richmond.edu
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