Mack Brown makes passionate defense on behalf of North Carolina assistant coaches

North Carolina‘s plans for a perfect season were spoiled by Virginia last Saturday as the Tar Heels suffered a 31-27 loss to the Cavaliers marking their first of the season.

This week Tar Heels head coach Mack Brown was asked about what his staff could have done differently to secure the win, and proceeded to answer the question with questions of his own about what the team should have done in their upset loss.

“Why didn’t defense stop them when it’s 24-14 and put us in a position right there to go up 17?” Brown asked raising his voice. “Why not? That’s what we’re supposed to do, that’s what you get paid for. And then offensively why don’t we kill some clock and run the ball some if we’re not throwing it consistent? Why don’t we do that?”

Brown’s passionate line of questioning was intended to highlight the frustrations surrounding the entire program following the loss, both internally and externally.

Every game has a winner and a loser, with questions aimed at what the winning team did right and what the losing team did wrong. But now that their first loss of the season is behind them, Brown is focused on uplifting his coaching staff as they move forward.

“You usually don’t get many answers because the coaches are great people. They’re great husbands, great fathers, they’re crushed that we didn’t do our job. They’re crushed,” Brown admitted. “And here I am, I’m jumping on them, they’re down, you all are jumping on them, media’s jumping on them, fans are jumping on them, everybody’s jumping on them. At some point on Tuesday you gotta start picking them up, and that’s what he do.”

Brown continued to defend his assistants, speaking on the intricacies and reality that come with the job as the team looks to bounce back and move forward this weekend against Georgia Tech.

“You gotta figure out what’s wrong, figure out why you didn’t fix it, and usually you say if I would’ve realized it I would’ve fixed it,” Brown explained. “You get in a game, you know you gotta win, you’re trying to keep you top 10 [ranking], you know things aren’t working, and sometimes you don’t handle things as well as you’d like to. They’re human beings, they’re not video games.”