Tar Heels go for the upset, but Tigers stuff 2-point try
UNC touchdown with 1:17 left cuts it to one, Clemson hangs on to stay unbeaten
CHAPEL HILL, N.C. >> The ball sat on the 3-yard line, forcing top-ranked Clemson into the most unexpected of positions.
Get a stop, or lose the lead late against heavy underdog North Carolina — and maybe the game along with its spot as the front-runner for the College Football Playoff.
The Tigers did it, stuffing the Tar Heels’ 2-point conversion attempt with 1:17 left to hold on for a 21-20 victory — narrowly avoiding an upset that would’ve shaken the national landscape in college football.
“It came down to one play, that’s what happens a lot of times,” Clemson coach Dabo Swinney said. “We made the play we had to make to win the game.”
The Tigers (5-0, 3-0 Atlantic Coast Conference) had trouble all day in trying to earn a program-record 20th straight win. They didn’t go ahead for good until Trevor Lawrence hit Tee Higgins on a 38-yard touchdown pass with 9:54 left, then came up with the stop after the Tar Heels went for the lead instead of a tie after Javonte Williams’ short scoring run.
The Tigers strung out Sam Howell’s option run to the right, with Xavier Thomas, James Skalski and Nolan Turner combining to bring down Howell as he turned toward the goal line.
Howell tried to pitch the ball back to Dazz Newsome as he was going down, but Newsome had nowhere to go near the sideline and was pushed out of bounds to put the Tar Heels (2-3, 1-1) short and effectively clinch the win for Clemson — though it was far tougher than expected for the 27-point road favorite on what Swinney called “a tough day at the office, no doubt.”
“I’d probably say they probably outplayed us,” Swinney said. “We made a lot of mistakes, a lot of critical, critical errors at critical times. But when we had to make a play, we made it. That’s what winners do.”
The Tar Heels certainly gave themselves a shot, jumping on Clemson with a game-opening TD drive for a 7-0 lead — the Tigers largest deficit of the season — and holding the Tigers to a season-low 331 total yards.
It was Clemson’s lowest point total of its 20-game winning streak, which includes last year’s 15-0 run to a fourth straight ACC title and second national championship in three seasons.
Yet the Tar Heels fell to 0-10 against No. 1-ranked teams in The Associated Press college football poll.
“I told the players that we’re not into moral victories,” UNC coach Mack Brown said. “That can’t happen, because you’ve got to learn to win. . I told them in my 31 years of coaching, I’ve never been prouder of their effort, because if I’m a reflection of the way those guys fought tonight, then I’m very, very proud of that.”
The Tigers had made everything look easy through the opening month of the schedule. The closest call had been a 24-10 win against a ranked Texas A&M team that didn’t reach the end zone in until the final seconds of a game long since decided.
But Clemson had all kinds of trouble getting going Saturday, from Travis Etienne’s first-half fumble to set up a UNC touchdown to multiple false-start penalties that continued undercutting the Tigers’ attempts to build momentum. In the end, the Tigers did just enough to stay unbeaten and avoid a shocking upset.
“We know it’s hard to win,” Lawrence said. “Sometimes it’s easy to forget that when you win so many games by so many points. This game is only going to make us better.”
The Tar Heels have lost three straight after a 2-0 start in Mack Brown’s return to the program he led more than two decades ago.