Beginning Saturday, Greg Little and the rest of the Tar Heels must perform if they want to maintain the buzz.

Aug. 26, 2008

By Lauren Brownlow

Going into the James Madison game last season, no one really knew for sure whether an incredibly young football team with a brand-new head coach would win or lose. The Tar Heel faithful had seen Carolina lose to Miami of Ohio and pull out a squeaker against William and Mary in recent season-openers.

The excitement in Kenan Stadium was palpable, but it was almost a nervous energy. That's why Carolina fans roared with every big hit, great punt or fantastic catch - they had no idea what to expect, good or bad, and they got plenty of the good that night.

But really, the coaching staff and the team itself did not have much more of an idea what to expect than Carolina fans did. "Last year, you had no idea what to expect. It was new schemes for us. The players, we didn't know how they were going to react. We've got some players that are back that we know pretty much how they're going to prepare, how they're going to handle a packed house crowd," Davis said. "So I think that there is a little less from that standpoint, but there are also higher expectations. We expect these players to play at a higher level and to perform and to execute at a better level."

Perhaps that game gave a young team confidence that it could compete. Carolina was rolling up James Madison the same way that perennial powerhouse programs pummeled their lesser opponents. For the rest of the season, Carolina went out thinking that it could play with anybody and most weeks, it did.

Carolina lost so many close games last year that if just two small mistakes had been erased in two games, the Tar Heels would have been bowl-bound. So the 2008 Tar Heels have chosen to focus on themselves.

"We talked to our football team about that how well you play to a high percentage is more about you. It's how you prepare; it's how you play on Saturday. You don't have any control over the opponent. I can't tell you whether they've had good practices or good practices. I can't tell you whether they're prepared to play. All we can do is control our own fate," Davis said. "If we'll show up and play and we talk all the time with our football players is that when the game is over, regardless of the outcome, if there's no regrets, then we will have played as well as we possibly can. We want to play, leave everything on the field and whatever happens, the next week we'll pick up the pieces and we'll go on and move to the next game. It's kind of 12 one-game seasons."

Now, this young and talented team is a year more experienced and even has the mainstream media paying attention to Carolina football again, calling the Tar Heels a potential `sleeper' in the ACC. Going into the season-opener against a speedy and talented McNeese State team, Carolina is feeling pretty good. But it's a fine line to walk between cockiness and confidence, between being downright arrogant and just having a swagger. It is a line the Tar Heels are carefully tiptoeing on now, trying to stay on the right side of it.

"I want to come out and just have that mentality of killing an ant with a sledgehammer, and that's what we're going to do. There are a lot of eyes on us right now and that's why we have that mentality," sophomore running back Greg Little, never one to lack confidence, said. "We have to come out and make a statement, make a huge statement actually. This is an opportunity for us to get that spotlight on us and now we have to make that light shine."

The last few seasons, it was easy to go down Carolina's schedule and mark probable wins, losses and toss-up games. This season, every game seems like it could go either way. While that means Carolina has no guaranteed wins, it also means that for the first time in recent memory, the Tar Heels have a legitimate chance to win each of the 12 games on its schedule - not to go undefeated, but to be competitive.

This Carolina team has more depth, more experience and will be more able to go out and play without thinking. There were plenty of young playmakers last season, but many of them had to spend too much time trying to remember where they were supposed to be and what they were supposed to do. Now, this Carolina team can go out and just make plays.

"Guys are a lot more loose in the way they're playing. They're able to just play rather than think about what they're doing. That way, you can actually have a lot more fun and do a lot more on the field," Little said.

Lauren Brownlow is the managing editor of Tar Heel Monthly.