North Carolina’s bowl destination isn’t nearly as clear as before the conference championship games. Days after seven of 11 media projections ticketed the Tar Heels for the Gator Bowl, the most common prediction (three of 11) has them playing Charlotte on Dec. 27 in the Duke’s Mayo Bowl.

RALEIGH — There was lots of blame to go around for North Carolina’s latest November shortcoming. Coach Mack Brown wanted to accept all of it.

You kind of had a feeling that was coming. UNC really hasn’t been the same team since they started the season 6–0, rose to No. 10 in the polls, and then lost to a bad Virginia squad at home.

For over 40 years, weird things have happened when Clemson and North Carolina play football. The first half on Saturday in Death Valley took the weirdness and bad karma up a notch.

CLEMSON, S.C. — After North Carolina fumbled away a potential 21-point early lead, the frustrations kept piling up for the Tar Heels despite solid early defense. Against a Clemson team playing far better than its record, the Tar Heels couldn’t afford mistakes, and Omarion Hampton — who had an otherwise productive day — fumbled twice in the first half to keep UNC from taking control.

By R.L. Bynum Carolina moved up two spots to No. 22 in the AP Top 25 after the Tar Heels’ … More

I’ve written this column (or a version of it) for over a decade. Sometimes, it writes itself, sometimes there’s a search to put things in the right slots, and sometimes there’s a wait until the clock hits zero to have it come together. And sometimes there is a Saturday night.