This is a beautiful Sunday. I've had a pretty bad cold for the last week, and I haven't been outside a lot, and cabin fever had set in, so, I went outside just a bit to enjoy some of the day. Up in the Carolina blue sky I noticed a group of buzzards circling about and my first thought: they're looking for John Bunting.
The sixth-year Carolina coach is in trouble. He's been the head coach of his alma mater since 2001, and only in that first year did he have a winning season. It's reasonable to think that with the resources they have for football at UNC that things would be improving. It did look like it in 2004, and even last years' 5-6 team played very competitive football.
But nothing has gone right this season. It's actually hard to think of any bright spots in the miserable 1-5 start. The expectations were reasonable to start the season. Nobody thought this would be a blockbuster season, but it appeared the talent was there for a winning season. This would be a season of progress, something to build on.
Saturday's 37-20 loss was a mirror of the whole season. Turnovers, penalties, porous defense, poor tackling, bad execution -- you name it -- and more importantly, another loss. The Tar Heels haven't beaten a Division I team this season.
The boos reigned down on Bunting on Saturday. This is a man who loves Carolina, who played on championship teams there as a player. He wants to win badly. He loves being the coach at Carolina. But the question now is, in his sixth year, can he get it done? Is he the man for the job?
Right now, it appears the man who looks and talks like a coach and is all football can't get it done. Maybe that will change. There are six games left, but it's very unreasonable to think Carolina will run the table. This is a team that is doing poorly in almost every facet of the game. I don't like to see people lose their jobs. In my profession, which is somewhat like coaching, I've seen good people let go and have hated it. Who am I to say? But in big-time sports, it's the coaches who take the heat. Carolina hasn't been good, I mean really good, since Mack Brown left. Make no mistake, Carolina fans want better than what they're getting. There are human buzzards wanting some of Bunting, and they just may get him.
They play at Virginia Thursday. The Cavaliers are not a good football team. If Carolina loses this one, we'll really know just how bad a team the Tar Heels are and how bad things will get for John Bunting.
Wake Forest is 6-1. Can you believe the Deacons haven't been 6-1 since 1944? So this is a big accomplishment for this football program. Think about the adversity this team has gone through -- losing its starting quarterback and its top running back to injury; losing that game to Clemson. But the Deacons are good. They play hard, and they believe, and they are in the thick of the ACC's Atlantic Division race. Jim Grobe knows football.
I still like State's remaining schedule. They have very winnable road games the next two weeks at Maryland and then at Virginia and another winnable road game at Carolina on Nov. 18. They will probably be an underdog to Geogia Tech at home on Nov. 4 and on the road at Clemson on Nov. 11. The game at Tigertown looms large.
No question -- Saturday's loss to Wake Forest hurt. A win and State is all alone in first in the Atlantic and has some cushion. Now they don't. State could've, should've but didn't.
And this has to be hard for State fans to swallow. The Pack has two game losing streaks to both Wake Forest and Carolina.
Just got through watching the Panthers win their fourth straight. Steve Smith is so good. He makes such a difference and the Panther defense always keeps them in it. That slow start, without Smith, is way in the past.
I've got a choice now. To watch more football, read or take a nap. I kind of like the nap idea.
