Four Downs: Rutgers dominates North Carolina in Quick Lane Bowl
In what was supposed to be a battle of powerful offenses going up against questionable defenses, instead it was Rutgers (8-5) finishing the 2014 season with a flourish in the Quick Lane Bowl with a convincing 40-21 win over North Carolina (6-7).
Rutgers has now been to a bowl game in four straight seasons, and Kyle Flood has been responsible for three of them. Flood is 23-16 at Rutgers and got his first bowl win as the head coach, ending the regular season with a win over Maryland after coming back from 25 points down.
Flood led the Scarlet Knights to a pretty successful first season in the Big Ten, winning two of its final three games, and this was a great way to cap it off -- three out of four. Four of Rutgers' losses were to teams that were either ranked at the time or spent time in the top 25.
On the other side, though, Larry Fedora and his Tar Heels had yet another slow start to the season (2-4) but bounced back by winning four of their next five games -- only to get blown out by NC State at home, 35-7. It's Fedora's first losing season as a head coach, and North Carolina's first losing season as a program since 2007.
North Carolina didn't have an easy schedule, but it was ranked (even if unfairly) going into this season, and the team's performance in its last two games -- not to mention a 70-41 egg at East Carolina, an inexplicable 34-17 loss at home to a bad Virginia Tech team and a 47-20 loss at Miami -- will not leave a positive taste in the mouth of UNC fans.
Three of North Carolina's first four drives reached Rutgers' territory, and two got into the red zone before stalling -- once on a seemingly-botched fake field goal, and again on a blocked field goal.
But North Carolina lost fumbles on its two other early drives, and the Tar Heels basically wasted any chance they had to capitalize on their defense forcing a few three-and-outs in a row, which was a rare enough occurrence.
Ill-timed penalties, miscues in all phases of the game, you name it -- North Carolina did it. And it has unfortunately been something that has characterized the Tar Heels under head coach Larry Fedora, although it had been improved somewhat over the latter half of the season.
Rutgers entered the game ranked 96th in the nation in total defense. North Carolina's last regular-season opponent, NC State, was 50th. North Carolina's explosive offense moved the ball at times against both -- more Rutgers than NC State -- but finished with just seven total points in the first three quarters combined of each game to show for it.
As flat as North Carolina looked early on, a lot of credit is due to its opponent -- Rutgers' offensive line was fantastic, paving the way for 340 yards on the ground on 42 rushes (a ridiculous 8.1 per carry). That was by far the best of the year for Rutgers, whose previous high was 284 yards rushing on 56 attempts against Navy (that was also their previous yards-per-carry high of 5.07).
Rutgers' passing offense had led the way for the Scarlet Knights this year, and the running game had been largely pedestrian, averaging just 3.97 yards per rush on the season. But Rutgers saved some of its best rushing performances for the end of the year, running for 356 yards on 75 carries in two of its last three games (both wins) in the regular season.
Without quarterback Gary Nova having a great game (9-of-20 for 184 yards and two touchdowns) and with standout wide receiver Leonte Carroo finishing with a relatively quiet stat line (two catches for 43 yards), the running game was dominant enough that it didn't matter.
North Carolina finished with two tackles for loss and no sacks. Freshman Josh Hicks continued his fantastic end to the regular season -- he ran for 214 yards on 44 carries in Rutgers' last three regular-season games (all but 24 yards and six of his carries all season long), and he had 19 rushes for 102 yards and a touchdown against the Tar Heels. That's 63 carries for 416 yards (6.6 per) and two scores in the last four games -- pretty good sign for Rutgers moving forward, even without its best two weapons in the passing game.
North Carolina struggled in the kicking game all year, mostly placekicking, as the Tar Heels' longest field goal of the year was a mere 30 yards. Kickers Thomas Moore (1-of-5) and Nick Weiler (5-of-8) went a combined 5-of-5 inside of 30 yards, but they were a combined 1-of-8 outside of 30 yards, including three attempts from 40 or more yards.
Yet for some reason, North Carolina faked a field goal from the Rutgers 5-yard line on 4th and 4 and had another attempt blocked late in the first half -- an attempt that came when North Carolina was down 20-0. The field goal attempt that was blocked was very poorly executed. The Tar Heels were without punter Tommy Hibbard, too -- suspended for a violation of team rules -- and they averaged 31.2 yards per punt.
Credit to Rutgers for taking advantage of all of this -- kicker Kyle Federico was 2-of-2 (from 19 and 31 yards) and did miss an extra point, but punter Joseph Roth averaged 44.7 yards per punt and had a long of 51. It wasn't stellar, but it was more than enough, and Rutgers' coverage units did a great job as well, limiting punt returner Ryan Switzer to five yards on three punt returns.
