Mack Brown sees growing confidence in North Carolina players

North Carolina has now reeled off three straight wins and head coach Mack Brown made a revelation after the game that is sure to please the Tar Heels faithful.

He thinks his team is starting to learn how to win.

“The guys are excited. They’re practicing hard,” Brown said. “They’ve practiced hard all year. I really think it’s more confidence that they know what they have to do to win. They’ve actually learned.”

Three straight wins provides at least some testament to that idea.

Of course, knowing how to win is certainly a new thing. The team had lost four straight prior to the recent winning streak.

“We have not played consistently well enough on defense to not play our best on offense and win a game,” Brown explained. “And we did that Saturday. There were two drives that we gave up on Saturday. The one right after the half and the one right at the end of the game that we’ve got to correct. Other than that, we played great defense.”

The result was a 31-24 win over Wake Forest, a relatively comfortable win at that. The Tar Heels took a two-touchdown lead with 2:26 to play in the contest, seemingly wrapping things up.

The Demon Deacons had other ideas. They quickly scored a touchdown to pull within a score, then nearly executed a brilliant onside kick.

So it became a learning experience for Brown’s North Carolina squad.

“I had a long discussion this morning about when you’re in one-minute at the end of the game and you’ve got a 14-point lead, just keep playing,” Brown said. “I mean don’t back off. Because then you just give stuff up. People do that all the time. And you’ve just got to keep playing. Even if they drive it, keep them in front of you. Don’t give them the big throw down the middle. That saved time for them and gave them a chance to have some excitement.”

Overall, though, Brown is happy with where North Carolina is at this point.

“We’re playing better defense, we’re forcing turnovers, we’re kicking it better so the offense doesn’t have to score 40 points to win every game,” Brown said. “And that’s the way we’ve been. If our quarterbacks didn’t play well, we lost. And that’s college football.

“This is more sound, fundamentally sound college football and how to win a game when you don’t have your best stuff. If you get in shootouts every game, you’re going to lose because you just, you can’t go score 40 points every game. That just doesn’t happen against good teams. And Saturday was a game where we didn’t panic on offense. We re-established ourself in the fourth quarter. We dominated time of possession in the first quarter and the fourth quarter, and that’s what gives you a chance to win.”