College Football’s Week Six:
DG’s “Pick Six” Includes Wake-NC State,
Pitt-UNC, Duke-Georgia Tech, App, ECU
By David Glenn
North Carolina Sports Network
Each week during college football season, we offer a “Pick Six” package of intriguing matchups — three “local” games that include one or more North Carolina-based team and three “national” contests that involve the Atlantic Coast Conference and/or the most prominent intersectional games.
Week Six: Top “Local” Games
Game Four
Wake Forest (1-3) at NC State (3-2), Sat., noon (The CW)
Latest Betting Line: Wolfpack a five-point favorite
Although NC State has dominated this rivalry historically, winning about two-thirds of the time, it may surprise a lot of people that it’s been a much more even matchup over the past two decades, which is when first Jim Grobe and now Dave Clawson have become two of the best coaches in Wake Forest football history.
Over the last 20 head-to-head gridiron matchups between the Wolfpack and the Demon Deacons, dating back to 2004, it’s exactly even — 10 victories for the Pack, 10 victories for the Deacs.
Adding some unpleasant context to this year’s contest, ESPN has an analytics tool called the Football Power Index (FPI). Heading into this game, the FPI has State and Wake ranked as the two worst teams in the expanded ACC. The Wolfpack is ranked 16th, and the Demon Deacons are ranked 17th.
Remember, Wake’s only win this season is over North Carolina A&T, a Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) opponent, and the Deacs have lost three straight — all at home — to UVa by one point, to top-10 Ole Miss by a 40-6 margin and to Louisiana of the Sun Belt Conference last week, 41-38. State, of course, was absolutely boat-raced by both Tennessee and Clemson, and none of the Wolfpack’s three victories — over Western Carolina, Louisiana Tech and Northern Illinois — came easily.
NC State appears to be the better team this year, mainly because the Wolfpack has more quality talent and playmakers on defense, although Wake Forest’s offense is definitely skilled and dangerous.
In a close game against Northern Illinois last Saturday, Wolfpack safety DK Kaufman — a fifth-year senior transfer from Auburn who was a two-year starter for the Tigers in the Southeastern Conference — came on a blitz, sacked the quarterback, caused a fumble and picked up the fumble and ran it in for a touchdown. In a contest the Wolfpack won by only seven points, that was clearly the Play of the Game.
State’s defense also includes standouts such as Davin Vann up front, Caden Fordham and Sean Brown at linebacker, and Ayden White at cornerback. That’s a pretty strong defensive foundation that Wake just cannot match or even approach right now personnel-wise, and that State defense is trying to lead the way while the Pack’s true freshman quarterback, CJ Bailey, continues to grow up.
Wake does have considerable talent on offense, including transfer quarterback Hank Bachmeier (he’s been very good so far), star running back Demond Claiborne (although he was injured in last week’s loss to Louisiana) and wide receivers Taylor Morin and Donovan Greene.
However, NC State probably views Wake’s defensive struggles as a chance for the Wolfpack offense to make more plays, both in the running game (with Duke transfer Jordan Waters and others) and the passing game, with Bailey throwing to star wide receiver KC Concepcion, talented tight end Justin Joly, and perhaps even wideout Wesley Grimes, a former Wake player and Millbrook High School product who transferred to State during the offseason to get back closer to home.
Game Five
Duke (5-0) at Georgia Tech (3-2), Sat., 8 pm (ACCN)
Latest Betting Line: Yellow Jackets a nine-point favorite
A quick shout-out is required here for first-year Duke coach Manny Diaz and the Blue Devils, regardless of what happens in Atlanta this weekend.
Duke hasn’t started 5-0 in football since 1994, when they did it under first-year coach Fred Goldsmith, who ended up finishing only 8-4 that season but also won the Bobby Dodd National Coach of the Year award.
The most obvious advantage Duke had over Carolina last Saturday was its absolute belief in its ability to execute its gameplan on defense, which is Diaz’s #1 area of expertise and which now has led the Devils to five consecutive victories despite highly inconsistent production from the team’s offense.
Duke’s 21-20 victory over Carolina, after trailing 20-0 midway through the third quarter, was a testament to good coaching, great conditioning and the ability to stick to the plan — even through considerable adversity, even against a hated archrival. It was the second-biggest comeback victory in Duke football history, and it happened in front of a sold-out crowd of 35,000-plus at Wallace Wade Stadium.
Quick side note: We were there to see it with our Old North State Tailgate & Traveling Sports Circus, all the way through the Victory Bell celebration on the field at the end. We encourage folks to check out Ben McCormick’s article — entitled “The Sewer” — about how the Blue Devils finally figured out a way to beat the Tar Heels, and how they believe their intense offseason conditioning program had a lot to do with their amazing second-half comeback against the Heels.
While all of Duke’s plaudits have been well-earned, Georgia Tech understandably is the favorite over the Blue Devils this week in Atlanta.
The main reason the 5-0 Devils aren’t ranked in the national Top 25 right now is that voters don’t respect the quality of their competition so far. Duke’s five victories are over Elon, Northwestern, UConn, Middle Tennessee State and UNC, and there’s not a single above-average football squad in that group.
Georgia Tech is not an elite team, but the Yellow Jackets probably will prove to be the best team Duke has faced so far this season.
The Jackets have one of the best dual-threat quarterbacks in the ACC in Haynes King, and it might surprise a lot of people that — among the ACC’s 17 teams — only high-powered Miami has scored more touchdowns than the Yellow Jackets have scored so far this season (22).
Under head coach Brent Key, a former All-ACC offensive lineman for the Jackets, Tech likes to run with the ball with both King from the QB position and reliable running back Jamal Haynes. King also has has two very speedy and productive wide receivers, Malik Rutherford and Eric Singleton Jr., at his disposal.
Tech also has played pretty strong run defense this season. The only teams that have defeated the Yellow Jackets — Syracuse and Louisville — got strong performances from their very experienced quarterbacks in the passing game.
That means Duke QB Maalik Murphy, the relatively inexperienced Texas transfer who made some big-time throws in the Blue Devils’ victory at Northwestern in overtime, may need to have one of the best games of his college career if he’s going to lead the Devils to an upset victory in Atlanta.
Game Six
Pittsburgh (4-0) at North Carolina (3-2), Sat., noon (ESPN2)
Latest Betting Line: Panthers a three-point favorite
There’s no need to sugar-coat it: 73-year-old UNC coach Mack Brown has a football-style crisis on his hands in Chapel Hill.
Now an undefeated Pitt team is coming to Kenan Stadium with a lot of confidence, just as the Tar Heels have tens of thousands of frustrated alumni in town for the school’s annual homecoming weekend.
Immediately after their 3-0 start, which included a solid road win at Minnesota, the Tar Heels gave up a school-record 70 points at home in a loss to James Madison, then coughed up a 20-0 third-quarter lead to Duke in what became the second-biggest comeback in Blue Devils football history. In that JMU game, remember, which happened on Family Weekend in Chapel Hill, tens of thousands of Carolina fans left the stadium at halftime.
Pitt coach Pat Narduzzi had by far the worst season of his 10-year tenure in the Steel City last year, when the Panthers had an anemic offense and horrible quarterback play on the way to a 3-9 record.
Thanks in part to a talent infusion, including an Alabama QB transfer and several key figures who were important parts of Western Carolina’s impressive football season last year, Pitt is putting up some big offensive numbers and already has impressive comeback victories over two of its regional rivals in non-conference play, Cincinnati and West Virginia.
The Panthers are averaging 48 points and 523 yards per game; both of those numbers rank behind only Miami among ACC teams.
They’re doing it under the direction of first-year offensive coordinator Kade Bell, son of Western Carolina head coach Kerwin Bell and the Catamounts’ former OC, and they’re doing it with former WCU running back transfer Desmond Reid rushing for more than 100 yards per game on about seven yards per carry.
Meanwhile, after suffering through horrendous QB play last season, Pitt has received a huge lift from redshirt freshman Eli Holstein, an Alabama transfer who was a big-time prep star in Louisiana before signing with the Crimson Tide out of high school.
Holstein has been a true dual threat for the Panthers, averaging almost 50 rushing yards and almost 300 passing yards per game. His favorite targets have been wide receivers Konata Mumfield and Kenny Johnson (also a very dangerous return man), plus Reid out of the backfield. The Tar Heels will have their hands full in this one defensively.
In terms of Xs and Os, the most fascinating aspect of this matchup will come when the Tar Heels have the ball.
The one thing this Carolina team does particularly well is run the football. As a team, the Tar Heels are averaging an ACC-best 209 rushing yards per game. Individually, UNC’s All-American junior back, Omarion Hampton, ranks first nationally with 114 carries and fifth nationally with about 132 rushing yards per game.
Under Narduzzi, who was a long-time defensive coordinator at Michigan State before taking the Pitt job, the Panthers tend to stack the box on defense and dare opponents to try to throw the football downfield, where their defensive backs play as physically and with as much contact as any defense in the country.
Pitt’s opponents are averaging less than three yards per carry on the ground so far this season, so it will be interesting to see #1-if Hampton can get going against another defense that’s designed specifically to stop him, and #2-whether Carolina’s fifth-year senior quarterback, former third-stringer Jacolby Criswell, can make enough big passing plays downfield to make Pitt pay for stacking the box.
Criswell is playing behind an offensive line that has had problems with pass-blocking all season, but he does have a strong arm, excellent tight ends in Bryson Nesbit and John Copenhaver and a stable of quality wide receivers, led by recent David Glenn Show guest JJ Jones.
East Carolina (3-2) at Charlotte (2-3), Sat., 3:30 pm (ESPNU)
Latest Betting Line: Pirates an eight-point favorite
The Pirates are flat-out a better team and a better program than the 49ers, and especially now that those two in-state schools are both members of the American Athletic Conference, ECU needs to prove it, convincingly, right there on Charlotte’s home field.
Especially with the 49ers averaging only 17.8 points per game and struggling to find any offensive rhythm with its backup quarterbacks, redshirt junior Trexler Ivey and true freshman Deshawn Purdie, the Pirates’ stingy and well-coached defense will be expected to create some turnovers and otherwise lead the way.
Appalachian State (2-2) at Marshall (2-2), Sat., 3:30 pm (ESPN+)
Latest Betting Line: Thundering Herd a three-point favorite
The most impressive-looking Sun Belt contenders so far this season have been the James Madison squad that beat UNC in Chapel Hill and the Louisiana crew that just beat Wake Forest in Winston-Salem. App State and Marshall, to this point, have been more deserving of a middle-of-the-pack label.
The Mountaineers have looked really shaky on defense especially, so it probably will be up to quarterback Joey Aguilar and the App State offense to carry the day if coach Shawn Clark is going to post an important road victory prior to his team’s difficult trip to Louisiana next week to face the Ragin’ Cajuns on their home field.
NOTE: For the complete Week Six schedule (including television/streaming options) for all ACC and state of North Carolina teams, please click HERE.