Wake Forest came into Chapel Hill with the 15th ranked defense in college football and left Kenan Stadium with the Tar Heel and the rest of North Carolina's foot in their ass to the final score of 50-14.
North Carolina got off to a rough start with Quarterback Marquise Williams throwing interceptions in the their first two drives and a three-and-out on their third drive. Wake Forest's defense was playing in your face aggressive defense and I was thinking "This is going to be a long game." The 'Heels got rolling in the second quarter with a long touchdown pass from Williams to Wide Receiver Mack Hollins and the Tarheels went on to score 29 points in the quarter to lead 29-14 at halftime.
There are times that I wonder if Tarheel coaches even know that Running Back Elijah Hood is standing in the backfield. He had eight carries for 101 yards and a long touchdown run but there was really only one series in the game that he was featured. Hood is well on his way to a thousand yard season and he doesn't even get 15 carries a game.
Freshman phenom (can you call a football player that?) and defensive lineman Jalen Dalton got his first action of his Tarheel career and had four tackles. The downside to him playing is that the Tarheels had to remove his red shirt because of injuries to the interior of the defensive line. Dalton was very active and Dalton said after the game "it's just football."
The light has come on for Senior Linebackers Shakeel Rashad and Junior Gnonkonde as Rashad has had an excellent season and Gnonkonde had the best game of his career against Wake Forest with nine tackles and two sacks and was all over the field. He was a disruptive force. I believe Rashad and Gnonkonde are both thriving under defensive coordinator Gene Chizik because of his return to the more traditional 4-3 defense. I don't think anyone thrived in the last couple of seasons playing the 4-2-5.
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