*
h- W -
Toppling Cavs
Puts Tar Heels
Back on Track
■ After starting the season
0-2, UNC’s bowl hopes were
grim. Saturday’s win has
rekindled those aspirations.
After kicking off the 1995 season with
two disappointing losses to Syracuse
and Maryland, Coach Mack Brown
declared that UNC was starting its season
anew.
Brown knew his team could have and
should have won those games. In the fol
lowing two contests, the Tar Heels evened
their record, albeit against feeble competi
tion. They squeaked by Louisville despite
a sloppy offensive game, and the offense
found its
rhythm with a
62-0 throttling
of Ohio. The
defense was
ranked tops in
the nation after
limiting the
Bobcats to 84
yards, but the
offense had yet
to score and
hold on to the
\ lUSTIN SCHEEF
COWIN’ATCHA
ball against decent teams.
The Tar Heels still had plenty to prove.
Saturday was redemption day. Time to
take on No. 9 Virginia, a team that had
come seconds and inches away from beat
ing Michigan in Ann Arbor. Time to take
on a team that had ruined the Tar Heels’
hopes for a major bowl for the past two
years. Time for some payback.
The Tar Heels proved they were up to
the challenge.
“What this means to us is that we’re as
good as we thought we were,” defensive
tackle Marcus Jones said. “People criti
cized us after those first two games. I’m not
saying they shouldn’t have, but we knew
what kind of team we have, and it was up
to us to prove it.”
What UNC proved was that on any
given Saturday it can play with the best
teams in college football. It limited the
Cavalier offense, which had been averag
ing 384.3 yards per game, to 266 yards
against UNC. The Tar Heel ‘D’ was for
real.
The offense also proved it could still
rack up the yards against the best defense
it’s faced all year. Mike Thomas again
threw for over 200 yards and only turned
the ball over once. The offense persevered
in pressure situations, scoring in the red
zone and converting two fourth downs
that led to nine points. The turnovers and
red zone difficulties led to the two losses
and almost a third at Louisville.
However, the solid performance against
Virginia shouldn’t be much of a surprise.
The team has moved the ball well and the
defense has played lights out every game.
It was the turnovers that killed North
Carolina against the Orangemen and the
Terrapins. It was just a matter of time be
fore the Tar Heels started to put it all
together.
“We had some key mistakes, and we
corrected them,” said comerback Fuzzy
Lee. “Now that I feel like we’re back on
track I really can't say that we were off
track we’re clicking on all cylinders."
FortheTar Heels to continue their quest
for a fourth-straight bowl game —a quest
that seemed doomed after starting 0-2
they must continue to run in high gear for
the rest of the season. That means no
letdowns like last year’s Clemson debacle.
Any unexpected losses now would be dev
astating.
“If we don’t play well at Georgia Tech
next week, we’re still fighting uphill,”
Brown said. “This one gives us a chance to
get back on track.”
Beating Virginia essentially saves UNC’s
season. What if the Tar Heels run the table,
save a loss vs. Florida State, and go 8-3?
That may sound far-fetched, but none of
the remaining opponents will be of
Virginia’s caliber. Duke and N.C. State are
floundering, Clemson still lingers on the
bottom of its sine curve, Georgia Tech is
improved but still beatable and Wake For
est is, well, Wake Forest. Another bowl
appearance is likely, if not a sure thing.
“It’s really going to spite us if we finish
like we’re playing right now and have to
look back at those first two games and be
disgusted with ourselves,” Jones said.
“That’s not the Carolina team I knew we
had at the beginning of the season. But
now that we’ve worked out all the mis
takes, we can go out on the field and play
with anyone, I believe.”
The Tar Heels proved that Saturday.
Random Thoughts
When Omar Brown almost blocked Will
Brice’s punt in the first quarter, maybe he
forgot Brice is a lefty. Brown was zeroing
in on his right 1eg.... You would think the
Virginia DBs would be ready for a second
Leon Johnson pass. Oops. ... What’s up
with Marcus Wall? ... Wake Forest is the
only team that can hold Maryland to nine
points and lose.
WOMEN'S SOCCER Page 8
The Streak Continues
Sophomore forward Robin Confer (left) scored
two goals and had two assists as the UNC
women's soccer team won its 25th straight
game by defeating two teams at The St
Mary's Classic.
Johnson ‘Feels Flow,’ Runs, Passes for 3 TDs
Is ' mV ifl...
TT it- t
r.' r
L—- 111 L_
T ... I, UTH/JOHN WHITE
Tailback Leon Johnson, evading UVa. linebacker Skeet Jones, was everywhere Saturday. He ran for 92 yards, caught
five passes for 48 yards and passed for 43 yards. He scored the winning TD in the fourth quarter on a 6-yard run.
Volleyball Sweeps League Foes
For 2nd Consecutive Weekend
BY ALEC MORRISON
ASSISTANT SPORTS EDITOR
AND JOSEPH ROLISON
ASSISTANT SPORTSATURDAY EDITOR
Football wasn’t the only sport in which
UNC exorcised demons against Virginia.
The UNC volleyball team avenged a
heartbreaking
home loss to
the Cavaliers
in 1994 by tak
ing a tight five
game match
from UVa. Sat
urday in
Volleyball
Virginia 2
UNC 3
Maryland 2
UNC 3
Carmichael Auditorium. The Tar Heels
(11-5 overall, 4-2 in the ACC) bested Vir
ginia(6-10,0-6) 12-15,15-11,15-13,11-15,
15-7 in front of a crowd of 226.
The win was UNC’s second five-game
victory of the weekend. On Friday, North
Carolina outlasted Maryland 14-16, 15-
11,15-5,9-15,15-8.
After the UVa. match, UNC coach Joe
Sagula said both wins were key victories
for the Tar Heels.
“Any win is a good win, without ques
tion,’’hesaid. “This is an important match
for us to win two ACC matches back to
mm SCHEDULE
Monday, Oct. 9
Volleyball at East Carolina, Greenville.
6 p.m.
Field Hockey vs. Radford, Navy Field.
7:30 p.m.
Wodneaday, Oct 11
Man'a Soccer vs. Davidson. Fetzer
Field, 7 p.m.
Friday, Oct. 13
Field Hockey vs. Virginia. Navy Field,
4 p.m.
Women's Soccer at Houston
Challenge Cup. Houston, Texas,
TBA.
Men's Tennis at Carolina Classic.
Cone-Kenfield Tennis Center, All
day.
Volleyball at Florida State. Tallahassee
Fla., 7 p.m.
SPORTS
MONDAY
®lfp Sailg (Bar Brel
back —as we did last weekend to go 4-
2 to put us in contention for the lead in the
conference.”
It didn’t look like the Tar Heels would
get that second consecutive win early in
the Virginia match. The two teams battled
back and forth throughout the game, but
UVa. took control behind strong front-line
play and hard hitting from outside hitter
Whitney Casey and captured the game 15-
12.
“We knew that Whitney Casey was
going to be real effective,” Sagula said.
“We tried not to have her pass that much.
She passed a lot ofballs, and she hit a lot of
balls. She had 30 kills in the match.”
But in the second game, the Tar Heels
grabbed an early 8-3 lead and didn’t look
back. Kristin Kruse, who finished the match
with 20 kills, appeared to be everywhere
during the game, constantly coming
through with clutch hits to keep the Tar
Heels in points. Amber Willey, who tallied
14 kills, led the way for UNC at the end of
the game with with a series of key kills and
blocks.
It was in the third game that UNC found
momentum to secure the match. Virginia
rolled to a 9-3 lead by capitalizing on Tar
Heel mistakes. But once UNC found cohe
Saturday, Oct 14
Men's Cross Country at State
Championships, Charlotte, 10 a.m.
Women's Cross Country at NCAA
Preview, Ames, lowa, 11 am.
Football at Georgia Tech, Alianta.
noon.
Field Hockey vs. Maryland, Navy Field.
Ip.m.
Man's Tennis at Carolina Classic,
Cone-Kenfield Tennis Center, All
day.
Volleyball at Florida State, Tallahassee.
Fla, 7 p.m.
Sunday, Oct 15
Men's Soccer vs. Radford. Fetzer
Field. 2 p.m.
Women's Soccer at Houston
Challenge Cup, Houston. Texas,
TBA
Men's Tennis at Carolina Classic.
Cone-Kenfield Tennis Center, All
day.
sion, it was unstoppable. The Wahoos
couldn’t recover from a barrage ofkills and
digs from Kruse, Willey and Anissa
Cronenberg, and the front line tandem of
Willey and Lindsay Smith proved too im
posing for UVa. hitters. UNC grabbed the
game, 15-13, and control of the match.
The Tar Heels nearly repeated their
comeback performance in the fourth game
as they narrowed a 14-6Virginialeadto 14-
11. The Cavs refused to lay down, though,
and forced the fifth and decisive game by
denying UNC another come-from-behind
win.
Yet Willey did not blame her team’s
physical weariness for the loss of the game.
“I think it was a little mental fatigue,”
shesaid. “Wejust had a whole lot of things
that didn’t go our way at the right time.”
Sagula said UNC’s rallies in the third
and fourth games were due in part to im
proved serving.
“We started serving more effectively,
serving the ball deeper on the court and
taking them out of their offensive flow,
which allowed us to dig more balls,” he
said.
UNC sealed the match by dominating
the fifth game, played under the rally-score
system, in which a team can score regard-
Men’s Soccer Loses Fourth Straight,
Falls to South Carolina, Charleston
BYHEIDIC. SCHMITT
STAFF WRITER
COLUMBIA, S.C. The Graveyard.
The word had dual significance for the
UNC men’s soccer team last week. For
one, The Graveyard was the site of the Tar
Heels’ latest
defeat, as UNC
(6-5) fell 3-1 to
South Caro
lina (7-2) Sun
day afternoon
at the famed
Mm's Sower
UNC 1
South Carolina.... 3
UNC 0
Charleston.... 3
field in Columbia.
Secondly,thegraveyard is where UNC’s
season is heading, as the Tar Heels are now
riding a four-game losing streak.
UNC entered the game without junior
goalkeeper Dimitry Drouin. Drouin, who
Cincinnati 16
Tampa Bay ..19
Pittsburgh 16
Jacksonville 20
N.Y. Jet 5........ 10
Buffalo 29
Carolina 27
Chicago 31
Green Bay 24
Dallas 34
Washington ...34
Philadelphia 37
Indianapolis 27
Miami 24
Seattle 14
Oakland 34
BYROBBIPICKERAL
SPORTS EDITOR
The ‘Natural’ is back.
After struggling through this season’s
first five games to regain the rhythm that’s
made him a standout runner in baby blue,
Leon Johnson used a combination ofbull
dozer strength, razor-sharp cutbacks and
swift offensive reads to return to his form of
old Saturday in North Carolina’s 22-17
conquest of Virginia.
“Leon Johnson played like a champion
today the two halfback passes, running
for extra yards, making some key catches
out of the backfield, ” Coach Mack Brown
said.
LJ was the do-it-all man. Eye his stats:
■ 23 rushes for 92 yards and two touch
downs
■ 2-for-2 passing
with a TD throw
■ five catches for
48 yards
Notbadforaguy
who hadn’t quite
found his sync in ‘95
despite three TDs
vs. Ohio.
“I think I’m feel
ing more at my
prime the way I
was last year,”
Johnson said. “My
legs are feeling re
LEON JOHNSON
threw for one TD and
ran for two others.
ally good now; I’m really feeling the flow
now. Now I just want to stay that way.”
One key to Johnson’s heyday? The half
back pass or, on Saturday, passes.
The first came on the third play of the
game. After rumbling for a first down at the
Wahoo 46, quarterback Mike Thomas
pitched right to LJ, who pulled up to find
an open Octavus Barnes 24 yards downfield
for the pass completion.
Boom. First down on the UVa. 30, and
four plays later LJ pounded it over the goal
line on the next play.
“Leon, he was recruited as quarterback
here, and he’s got an arm,” Thomas said.
“You know, people want to run up to the
ball, and Once he gets his hands on the ball
... then, hey, he can throw the ball down
the field and make a big play.”
Wideout Octavus Bames said: “We
knew they had an aggressive defense, and
that they came hard. They came at Leon,
- * * W ■ W*
Wf 0 . mm
IHj
DTH/JOHN WHITE
Kristin Kruse (3) and Jill The Kill' Peden (5) go up for a block against
Maryland on Friday. Kruse tallied 31 kills as UNC won in five games.
less of who is serving.
“Our momentum carried us through
the game,” Kruse said. “I don’t think we
were out there thinking that we were ex
scored the Tar Heels'
lone goal of the
weekend.
has played 856 mi
nutes this season, was
injured Wednesday
night against Col
lege of Charleston.
UNC lost 3-0.
Senior keeper
Patrick Smith took
Drouin’s place in
goal, marking his
first career start, and
posted six saves.
The Tar Heels
came out intense,
fighting off a pow
erful Gamecock at
tack for the first 35 minutes.
However, USC’s first goal seemed to
define the game. Junior forward Chuck
Prosser scored off assists from freshman
NFL Scores
Tonight's game:
San Diego at
Kansas City
Houston 17
Minnesota ..23
Arizona 21
N.Y. Giants .27
Cleveland 20
Detroit 38
Denver 37
New England.. 3
Monday, October 9,1995
and that left things open.”
It was a good coaching call for UNC,
and the UVa. defense should have taken
note because the Wahoo comers bit
again just one quarter later.
On a second-and-5 play inside the red
zone, Thomas pitched to Johnson, who
scanned the end zone for a toss attempt.
UVa. safety Paul London bithard, coming
up close to try to stop the run, and Johnson
loped it to senior Marcus Wall for six.
“I saw Marcus wide,” Johnson said.
“When I saw him, I wanted to get it to him
in the end zone, because me and Octavus
have both gotten touchdowns and Marcus
hadn’t gotten in.
“Marcus got his.”
But so did LJ, because it was his first
touchdown toss as a Tar Heel.
Not that he hasn’t thrown TDs before.
At Freedom High School in Morganton,
Johnson was an option quarterback who
threw for seven TDs in 1991.
“In high school I had an arm,” Johnson
said. “But now that I’m here, I’ve put on a
little more weight and muscle. I can still
throw the ball, there ain’t no doubt, but I
feel right now, I’m a running back. If you
want me to throw the ball, I’ll throw the
ball, but I’d rather you give me the ball and
let me run it down the field.”
Good thing, because U’s running game
has become the meat and potatoes of the
Tar Heels’ scoring drives. The classic case
was on UNC’s winning TD drive.
With just over 12 minutes left in the
game and Virginia ahead by one, Johnson
took five of the final seven snaps to push
the ball to the Wahoo 6. From there, he
took a pitch from Thomas and bulldozed
around the right side —with several Cavs
grasping at his jersey for the score.
“I saw the hole and I thought I could
breakthrough,’’hesaid. “Isawacoupleof
the Virginia players over-run me, so I cut
back against them, then caught a little hop
over a player And when I landed, I saw
that I could get the touchdown, so I kept
my legs pumping and went on in.
“I wanted the ball; I was pumped. ...
Coach Brown called that play, and I just
followed Chris Watson around."
That’swhyJohnsonwillnotbeabackup
QB; that’s why he prefers to stay a runner.
“I like quarterback, but I’m a running
back now and that’s where I’m gonna
stay.”
hausted. Energy was definitely out there.”
Yet UNC could easily have been run
See VOLLEYBALL, Page 11
Tony Soto and sophomore David Tart at
the 35:23 mark.
UNC coach Elmar Bolowich said that
the goal came when UNC controlled the
game, but the Tar Heels lost their tempo
after the score.
“The first goal came at a moment where
we just took over the game," he said. “We
controlled the pace, we controlled the op
ponent. It was a well-executed counter
attack on their part. Those are the breaks
we’ve been getting all year. It’s a continu
ing struggle for us.”
Junior midfielder Hector Suarez said
the Tar Heels played well in the first half
but that they need to take advantage of
opponents’ errors more efficiently.
“When they make a mistake, we need to
See MEN’S SOCCER, Page 11
14