It’s amazing how the same result-a bowl loss-can be interpreted in completely different ways a year apart. Last year, the Tar Heels showed out well against a Texas A&M team that some thought should have been in the College Football Playoff. That result was the spur for a huge amount of optimism going into the 2021 season.
The Tar Heels lost that game by 14.
This year the Tar Heels lost their bowl game by only three more points, but the mood is a complete 180. UNC was never really in the Duke’s Mayo Bowl, and once they punted down eleven in the second half it was pretty clear that a severely shorthanded South Carolina Gamecock squad was going to get a wire-to-wire win.