North Carolina Survives TCU 15-10 in a Fumble-Filled Opener
Three fumbles lost, two of them by North Carolina, and the Tar Heels still won. Fine. I will take it.
The final was 15-10 and it started as a swap of leads. North Carolina went up 3-0 on a 20-yard Aeron Burrell field goal, and TCU tied it with a Kyle Lemmermann kick from 31 yards before Jon Denman ran in from 2 yards out to make it 10-3 with 4:00 left in the first quarter. That 7-point hole was the biggest the winner had to climb out of. Jaylen McGill answered with a 9-yard run with 1:04 left in the quarter, and it was 10-10.
Then the scoring slowed to a crawl. North Carolina took the lead on a team safety late in the second quarter, 12-10, and Burrell kicked a 28-yard field goal early in the third to make it 15-10. That was the last score of the game. TCU had the rest of the third quarter and all of the fourth to answer and did not.
The yardage was close, 322 for North Carolina and 312 for TCU, with the Tar Heels throwing for 232 and the Horned Frogs running for 137. Jeremy Payne carried 25 times for 142 yards and caught five passes for 27 more, which makes him the top fantasy scorer of the day (21.9) and also a player on the losing team. Ed Small had nine catches for 65 yards. For UNC, Jelani Thurman caught four passes for 94 yards.
North Carolina is 1-0 and TCU is 0-1. TCU lost at home by five and scored a single touchdown.