It's another edition of Wral Triangle and two. Welcome in. I'm Mark Bergen joined today by Graham Hill from 99 9. The fan is filling in for Luis Fernandez and Graham was a great weekend for Triangle football. North Carolina and Duke losing their respective games. We're gonna start in Chapel Hill. You were their boots on the ground. North Carolina's lost against Virginia a 23.5 point favorite and the tar heels lose to the Cavaliers. I wanna give you first crack at this. What did you see in this game because you were physically there on Saturday night? Yeah, Mark, thanks for having me on trying on too. I feel like you've gone to the bullpen uh with me filling in for Luis Fernandez. Unfortunately, I'm not as handsome as him, but I'm gonna do my best to provide very good insight as Lewis would. But yeah, just straight to the point. The game on Saturday between Virginia and North Carolina remind me of a lot of uh North Carolina's loss last year to Georgia Tech when they lost uh 21 to 17. North Carolina was favoring that one too and North Carolina was ranked the highest they had been at that point in the season at 13. And you just saw, you saw a lot of similar similarities as far as North Carolina just being their own worst enemy, not being able to stay on the field. And there was a lot of plays. I'm sure that Matt Brown Chip Lindsay Jim C Drake May would go back and look and say, man, I wish I had that one back. But yeah, kind of loom and gloom leaving the stadium Saturday night as you can imagine. But there's still a lot for North Carolina to play for. It's just a question of, ok, how can North Carolina make sure this loss to Virginia this past week and not snowball and to what we saw last season after that Georgia Tech loss where they lost four straight to close out the year. Yeah. Yeah, I'm with you there and Matt Brown speaking with media members today, we're recording this Monday October the 23rd taking accountability and responsibility for the loss. And I think that's a telltale sign of why he's a national championship winning coach. I'll say this though too. We could talk about Drake May's interception whether it was an interception or not. But to me, this game came down to abandoning the running game. Amarian Hampton was going off. The sophomore running backs, had a great season for the tar heels. He only gets five carries in the second half and Virginia comes into the game dead last in the AC C in rushing yards and they pop off for more than 202 120 yards on the ground. And time of possession. To me, the tar heels play so fast offensively to where Virginia had the ball for almost 37 minutes. So Graham, you talk to any player that's played the sport and from a defensive standpoint when your defense gets put on the field for that long. I think the common narrative is gonna be, oh, well, the tar heels defense reverted back to the 2022 form. I'm not buying that. What I'm saying is is that they were left out on the field for too long. Any defense is gonna get exhausted if you're losing the time of possession battle almost 2 to 1. Yeah, you gotta have NFL level, uh, conditioning to be playing out in the field that long if you're a defense and you're exactly right. I mean, Matt Brown talked about it in his press conference with the media today. Go into the spring. He said the goal was to stop the run. U VA had over 200 Russian yards. Hollins and Jones, the two running backs combined for 133 of the 238 Russian yards alone. And then you're exactly right. Amarian Hampton coming into this game had been a freight train on the field. I mean, just absolutely just contributing to the Russian category. And in the game, this past Saturday, uh, as you mentioned, only carried the ball five times in the first half when he did carry the ball, he was averaging about seven yards a place. So I, I don't know why they resorted to stop me with the run game. If anything, I, I, if you're, if Marian H is not getting what you want to see, which I thought he was, I thought he was gaining a good amount of yards every time he touched the ball. I don't know why you don't go back to what you did last week in Miami. You know, he had a receiving touchdown. I don't know why you don't try to put the ball in his hands in passing. But yeah, ma and Hampton on the ground has been a freight train has been a big workhorse for this Carolina's offense and just in the second half was just non-existent. I, I, like you said, I think that contributed to North Carolina not being able to continue plays and putting their defense right back out there on the field in tough situations. All right, I wanna bring up the point where North Carolina gets the ball back. They force a fumble and Drake May is trying to lead his team down the field down four for a game winning score. Did you think James Jackson's interception was an interception? Because that referee replay was tough to me, I thought the ball moved and look, you might say, oh, Mark, you're being a homer in North Carolina's favor. I, I legitimately like, I don't know if it was definitive to say you could definitely overrule what was ruled in interception on the field. But I also don't look at that replay and definitively say, oh, yeah, he definitely caught it. Yeah, I, I hear what you're saying, Mark, but I'm also the kind of guy when you're a team that's talented as North Carolina, you're six and oh, come to that game, you're ranked uh 10th in the nation. You don't let a play like that dictate what the, the entire game. I, I think North Carolina besides that one play and it was a bad ball thrown by, by Drake May. But other than that, you know, like I said, there's a lot of plays that North Carolina left out there on the field, but they just didn't capitalize. So I get what you're saying. But in a game like that, you and I'm sure Matt Brown would say this too. You never want to leave it up to the official, you never want to leave it up to an official review. So I the interception hurts and yeah, it was definitely the dagger of the game because it gave Virginia the ball back with about two minutes left and they just ran out the clock. But there, there's plenty of other opportunities that Drake may could have made where he just kind of overthrew receiver or receiver didn't catch the ball in a crucial moment. I, I don't think that one interception was the deciding factor in that loss. I think that's fair. May 24 48 in the game. And if you go back and look at that interception too, his left tackle just point blake period gets beat in a one on one scenario and so the tar heels will look to regroup. But, uh, Graham, I think you hit the nail on the head too when you're up 24 to 14 and you have a running game like the Tar heels have and it's not just home and Hampton British Brooks is pretty good out of the backfield too. To me, that should be the recipe of put a team away that you're favored by by like 23.5 points. And that didn't happen, uh on Saturday. So the tar heels will look to regroup against the Georgia Tech team that they've now lost to in the previous two meetings. So we'll see how North Carolina fares playing in Atlanta as well. Um, but man, it was, uh, it's a brutal loss considering how hot the Tar heels have started this season. Any final thoughts from this game, Graham and we'll move on to duke, but any final thoughts from North Carolina. No, I have a lot of final thoughts just regarding the game against Virginia itself, I'm sure a lot of coaches, I'm sure Matt Brown would tell you, he put a 24 hour rule in effect real quick after that loss. And, uh, got the guys in there on Sunday and just told him to go ahead and move on to that game on the road in Georgia Tech. And it's funny, Mort, because this past week over here at 999, the fan, if he wasn't to the Adam Gold show, he used the analogy. Last week of Virginia should have been a game where the offense showed its fireworks and May and Te Walker and Hampton, it just didn't happen. And I it feels like Georgia Tech was supposed to be the, the coffee table in the middle of the night that you stump your toe against because Matt Brown said it too. He's lost two of the last three against Georgia Tech since his time back at North Carolina and going back to 10 of the last 12 meetings, North Carolina has lost 10 in the last 12 down in Atlanta. So the A TL has not been good to the tar heels. So again, this is just a situation where you lose a game like that at home to an unrated opponent and you could even say maybe one of the worst teams in the AC C and I, I'm not trying to be harsh when I say that, but it's just a matter of, do you not go. How does this not snowball into what we saw last year where you lose to Georgia Tech at home, then you lose to NC State, you lose to Clemson in the A ECC championship game and then you lose to Oregon in your bowl game. That's gonna be the real interesting part moving forward is, can North Carolina prove that this is not going to be a wash over from what we saw last year? And can they go down there with a little chip on their shoulder and playing with some fire underneath them and get the wind on the road against Georgia Tech this weekend? Yeah, Graham, you're exactly right because you got Georgia Tech Campbell Duke Clemson NC State. So that last three game stretch is what everyone was talking about when it came to North Carolina is, can you go into the AC C championship game, potentially either undefeated now, potentially with one loss? We'll see what the tar heels do here in the coming weeks. But Graham, uh Mike Elko, the Duke head coach also speaking with reporters today and he reiterated a common refrain that he's used time and time again saying K Le Leonard is day to day. I'm gonna be honest with you here. It didn't make sense why they took him out of the game. I know he reaggravated his ankle injury. But when a player is begging and pleading to go back in the game, we are not doctors Graham, nor do we claim to be. But you've got the adrenaline going. You're a one loss team. And to me it's like your season is on the line. Duke is past the point in the Mike Elko era for moral victories. They were in that game and they also led by 10 points. Why Riley Leonard wasn't allowed to go back in the game. Maybe I don't understand the full extent of his ankle injury. But even on this Monday following Saturday's game, it still doesn't make sense to me. Yeah, Mark, you're exactly right. I mean, we're not doctors. There's a reason why I'm working radio and that's just because my mathematics isn't too good. But, uh, to me going into that game last week or for Duke going to that game against Florida State, I was under the impression that you don't play Riley Leonard unless he's 100%. I mean, three weeks after a high ankle sprain, even if he's at 80% I don't think you take the risk of trying to play him. Now, Duke did and give Duke credit. They almost got away with it as they almost pull the upset. But uh it, it's just one of those things where Riley Leonard to me, I think it's too valuable of a player and a quarterback to that team than just that win uh to Florida State. I, I gotta go back and look at the standings to see how this really affects Duke's chances of making an AC C championship game. But, I mean, Duke still has a lot to play for. It may not be for an AC C championship now, depending on how the rest of the season goes. But Duke has an opportunity to be, in my opinion. I think they could still be a New Year's six team playing in a bowl game. Um, so I, I get it. I, I know I understand the passion that Riley Leonard possessed and I know how much he loves to win. That's just the competitive nature. But again, Riley learn is too big of a player to risk injuring or getting injured even more than Duke getting that big win on the road. I know Duke and the fan base would love to have seen the upset happen. But you know, there, there's still a lot that Duke can play for to make this season even better than what they accomplished last year. That's fair. But when he's, this is where I'm going to respectfully disagree. Graham when he's doing his best de best deck Prescott impersonation on the sidelines, like your adrenaline's flowing. You're ready to go like see what the ankle is like after the game. And again, I don't know the full extent, like if we're talking about a break, if we're talking about a sprain, we don't know the extent of it because all we get is day to day and sometimes that's all the coaches are allowed to give media members and reporters, but like I just would wanna know if we could give Mike Elko truth serum. What went into your decision to say, hey, you've got a player, your starting quarterback, your captain pleading with you on the sidelines and you're saying, no, we're gonna go with the backup, a backup who only completes one pass for seven yards and your offense only musters 35 yards for the rest of the game. That game was there for the taking in my opinion. Yeah, but at the end of the day on the road, in that kind of atmosphere, you have to be more efficient in the third game, execute better and not only, I mean, you're right, Bland only completed one pass, but Raleigh only completed seven. So that's eight total completed passes. II, I just don't think that in any football game that stat line is gonna favor you in any way. And I also think the difference in playing be in that situation and not continue to play. Riley is at the end of the year. That could be the difference between. Now, let's just say a 10 and 29 and three overall final record to Riley Leonard gets hurt even worse, potentially out for the rest of the season. Next thing you know, Duke finishes five and seven. Now they might would be the best five and seven team that we've seen a while. But I, I think that and again, we, we won't, we won't know the answer. II I Elko is not going, is not gonna tell us. But I, I just think that if you risk playing Raleigh more and it becomes a very serious injury, that can be the difference between Duke finishing 10 and 29 and three making a great bowl game or the rest of the Sea or the rest of the season just going down the drain for the Blue Devils. That's fair. Graham. I have one question for you then though, what's he doing out there playing in this game in the first place? Then again, I think Duke was just trying to take the risk of seeing, you know, Riley could be at 70% 80%. We're gonna try it and as soon as we get our first scare, that's gonna be our sign to not push, not push even further. Uh That's the only, again, I'm not a head coach. Um But that's just really the only logical explanation that I can make. Uh if Raleigh was saying before the game, he was ready to go, then yeah, let's put him out there, let's see what he can do. But again, as soon as the first kind of hold your breath moment occurs in the game, that might be the sign that we, we don't need to push the, the ankle injury any further than it already is. Now, and Duke's gonna have Louisville on the road this weekend, they've got a really good running back in, uh, Jordan averaging almost 7.5 yards per carry. And then, man, I was just hoping these teams would continue winning for this sake. Gram, I look at the schedule and I look at, hm, the November 11th game ESPN S college game day is very adept that come to the triangle for basketball and for hoops, I would have loved to see it in Chapel Hill, but I think that's gonna be a bit more of an uphill battle at this point considering that Duke now has two losses in North Carolina just suffered its first loss of the season. Yeah, you gotta go and look at the rest of the college football schedule that week. I mean, that, that determines a lot of it. Uh, but I'm right there with you. I've been advocating last week on the radio that it would have been so cool to see the first ever Duke versus North Carolina college game day appearance for something other than basketball. But I, we'll see again, we gotta go look and see what the schedule looks like for Saturday, November 11th, if it's not college game day. I think that game still has the potential to be, let's say a 3 37 o'clock, 7 30 kick on ABC or the ESPN still, it's just not gonna have, uh, you know, the, the rest of the guys like Herb streak. Um, Desmond Howard, uh and K Pat mcafee, I just would have loved to have seen Pat mcafee again in, in North Carolina. Um You can't forget about Reese Davis, the captain of it all, but that, that game to me is still going to be one of the biggest North Carolina Duke football games. It, it, it might be the biggest Duke versus North Carolina football game we've seen between the two programs, but it's still gonna have a lot to play for, for the two teams. It's just gonna, it's gonna add to the rivalry given that both teams are now battling to give their respective basketball programs on their campus a little more competition as far as relevancy goes. Graham. I love it. And, uh, this upcoming weekend NC State is gonna have Clemson at home at Carter Finley Stadium and then the Panthers coming off their bi week and, uh, I'm gonna take on the Houston Texans. You get Bryce Young CJ Stroud and I know that you guys are over at 99 9. The fan are gonna be all over the football action this week. Yeah, good news. At least the Carolina Panthers and NC State or Wol Wol Pat didn't lose. I mean, that's the one thing that you can look for. But yeah, you're right. I mean, NC State, man, they're at a crossroads, uh, for their season four and three overall. Uh, still one win in the AC C, I mean, this bi week comes at a very crucial time. And Dave Dorn also talked about it with the media today. This is in his time coaching here at NC State. This is the latest of bi weeks ever come for him during his program week eight and you know, with their five games remaining on schedule, I mean, Clemson Miami at home and just got announced that's gonna be an 8 p.m. kickoff on I believe ABC, you go to Wake Forest on the road, you go to Virginia Tech on the road and I know Wake Forest and Virginia Tech aren't playing their best football. You could even make the argument that Virginia Tech might be one of the worst teams in the AC C I disagree. But in a conference like this at this part of the season, it's hard to get a road no matter who you're playing. And then of course, the team right down the road and Chapel Hill comes over to Carter Philly Stadium. Now, Carter Philly Stadium has been sort of a nightmarish place for North Carolina to play and we all know what happened the last time the tar heels were in Raleigh, but NC State has an opportunity to kind of right the wrongs of the season against a Clemson team. That let's be honest, is not Clemson teams of the past. If anything, Wolves Tripp's kind of been wasted a little bit. He was wasted a little bit in that loss. To Miami. This is the first time we've seen a Shipley, uh, or a Clemson offense that allows will Shipley to get tackled behind the chains. And this is also a Clemson team that we've seen for the first time in a while that really struggles to score in the end zone and NC State give them credit. Dave Doran talked about it a couple of years back after they lost to Wake Forest at home. Uh when Brian Philly's senior year, the Thursday night game on ESPN and then absolutely went and sizzled Jack Louisville on the road. Doran says sometimes they play their best football and their backs against the wall. So this could be a really prime opportunity for NC State to get things back on track against a Clemson team that they don't like in the conference and in front of their home, in front of their home crowd for homecoming. Yeah. Yeah, we'll see Dave Doran only beating Clemson once in his tenure and he's been the NC State coach since 2013 and doesn't get any easier because I know Clemson like NC State also coming off a loss, but we'll see how both teams try to look to regroup on Saturday in Raleigh. Uh Graham. If there's anything you'd like to plug, whether your own socials coverage you have over at 99 9, the fan, please feel free now to take the opportunity to do so. Yeah, I'm kind of the backup uh or the backup pitcher, backup quarterback of the producers. You can hear me from time to time on the Adam Gold Show this afternoon. I'll be on the drive with Tim Donnelly producing. We'll be recapping sort of what we just talked about. So, Mark, thank you. You've made my job easier. I just kind of got to go on the air and, uh, ri rinse and repeat what I just told you, but be sure to follow me on Twitter at Graham Hill 98 and uh Mark, I really appreciate the time and thank you for trusting me to uh sit in for Lewis today for this Triangle two episode. Graham. Happy to provide some warm up for, for you before you're on the air today at three o'clock on 99 9. The fan. Good to see you as always. I hope you're well over at 99 9, the fan part of the CBC family. I'll go ahead and sign up for the book for Graham Hill filling in for Luis Fernandez. I'm Mark Bergen. Thanks for watching Wrl Triangle and Two. We'll see you next week till then. Take care so long. Everybody.