Locked On ACC - Daily College Football & Basketball Podcast - ACC SQUAD - What Happened in Week Five for the ACC

Episode Date: October 2, 2025

Breaking down the biggest news from the ACC this past week. The Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets survived a meeting with the Wake Forest Demon Deacons. Then, going over the Florida State Seminoles' thrilling loss to the Virginia Cavaliers before looking ahead to this weekend's matchup with the Miami Hurricanes. Follow & Subscribe on all Podcast platforms…🎧 https://link.chtbl.com/LOACC?sid=YouTube Locked On College Conferences, HBCU, Basketball & More🎧 https://linktr.ee/LockedOnCollege #ACC #CollegeFootball #CollegeBasketball Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Virginia and Georgia Tech fans sure are happy, but boy, did ACC officiating come under fire again this weekend. We better assemble the squad. You're talking ball with the ACC squad. From Florida State to North Carolina, from Syracuse to Miami, and from NC State to California, it's the local experts of the Locked-on Podcast Network, bringing you scoops, breakdowns, and the most comprehensive preview of the upcoming ACC weekend. Hang on, it could get loud. It could get heated and it will definitely be fun.

Squad up, you're part of the ACC squad. Hey there, what's up? It's Thursday. Boys, it's October. How is that already here? It's crazy to think you're joining us here on the ACC squad, all part of the Locked On podcast network. It's your team every day.

This episode is brought to you by Mazda. Like all our players on our teams, Mazda sweats every single detail because when you make every moment count, pulling off the unexpected is only the beginning. Stay tuned later for highlights in this week. moving the game forward. Mazda move and be moved. All right. Joining us today on the ACC squad, we got Jackson Holeser, the great host of Lockedon, Syracuse, Kenton Gibbs, one half of the Lockedon Wolfpack guys, our friend, Grayson Booneoff celebrating his

birthday somewhere, something crazy like that. Mr. Morgan Thomas, the host of Lockedon Clemson, great to have him here with us. And of course, our guy, JJ Jackson, the host of Locked on Blue Devils. I'm Isaac Shade, the host of Locked on Tar Heel. filling in for our guy, Alex Dono, because he's off getting ready for Miami Showdown coming up this week at Florida State. We'll obviously talk about that later in the show today, the showdown in Tallahassee. But before we get to that, we got a whole bunch of stuff from last weekend to talk about, including the ACC refs coming under fire again, Georgia Tech surviving.

What happened in Raleigh? We'll have to ask Kenton about that and a whole bunch of other action, including the fight and JJ's romping up in Syracuse against the fight and Holzers. Crazy stuff there. All right, boys. Here's why we got to talk about the reps. Friday evening, Virginia, home in Charlottesville, crazy scene where the crowd is just pressing in on the field against number eight, Florida State. The Wahoos win in overtime, 46 to 38.

The big question was 29 in overtime where a clearly missed neutral zone infraction? would have given a first down to Wake Forest. They could have iced the game victory formation because Georgia Tech had no timeouts, boys. Do we need to have a conversation about the ACC refs? I mean, I don't know why we're just now having this conversation. It's been like this for forever. The exact same call that costs Wake Forest in this game

was the exact same call to cost NC State last week against Duke. That's right. The score was 14 to 20. NC State is driving at their plus 30. A guy, they said we did not have a play called. The center was only supposed to snap the ball if somebody jumps. Somebody jumps. The center snaps the ball.

They throw the ball because they did not have a play on. They throw the ball as C.J. Bailey is about to get crushed. Interception returned back to the eighth. So what should have been on a fourth and two, an extended drive, that could have potentially put you up 23 to 14 going in the halftime, you now go in trailing 21 to 20. Why are we acting like this is a new thing? This is something that's been a problem with the ACC officials forever.

This was a problem with the Georgia Tech game against Miami last year, where the Miami runner was clearly down. And just because Mario Cristobal was being an idiot running a play when he should have taken a knee does not negate the fact that the runner was clearly down. But the ACC refs continue to be the ref show. they continue to screw teams over. And so at this point, what do we do besides point out the continued incompetence that continues to happen by officials in the ACC?

Sometimes I think officials are just spectating. They're just like us. They're just like everyone else. But they're on the field. They get the best view. They get to just watch the game. And they're just spectating. And they just get to throw a flag or not throw a flag whenever they want.

I mean, that missed call in that Georgia Tech game was just absolutely egregious. Wake Forest does everything right. The guy jumps in the neutral zone. You know what you do when the guy jumps in the neutral zone? You get a free play. It's a free play because you know that it won't count regardless. Nothing bad can happen to you because the guy jumped off sides. And the officials missed it.

They missed it. But that being said, Wake Forest, this is my message all the time when we talk about officiating. We can acknowledge bad officiating. Can we also acknowledge that Wake Forest in this game led 20 to 3? And they blew it. I understand they would have won how the officials made that call, but they had a 20 to 3 lead in the second half against Georgia Tech. Six minutes left in the third quarter, they had that lead.

I'm sorry, but like I don't have a lot of sympathy for you. I just don't. I don't. Don't put yourself in that situation. You were on cruise control. You were on autopy. and you put yourself in a position where the officials could screw you over. Just like, you know, Kenton mentioned that example from a couple years ago with Miami and Georgia Tech.

Miami put themselves in position to have the officials screw them over. You know why? Because they ran the ball. They could have just taken a knee and the officials would not screw you over there. It's a freaking knee down. That's it. So stop putting yourself in position where the referees may be able to screw you over. Instead, maybe hold on to a 20 to 3 lead.

throughout the fourth quarter, and we're not having this conversation about ACC rats. They suck. What else is new? You got to play through it. It is what it is. I still can't even believe that Wake Forest had that lead. I mean, 20 to 3, I never would have had. I didn't have that on the bingo card going into it.

And the fact that they blew the lead and obviously had that call at the end, it's got to sting so much more there in Winston, Salem this week. But the job of the teams is to be one point better than their opponent. It is not to be so much better that no amount of variance from the officials matters. It's to be one point better within the rules and confine of the game, which Wake Forest objectively showed had they been given a call. That was there, at least with the NC State and Duke thing, you could at least make the argument that was going in the half time.

NC State had a whole half to rectify that problem. Sure. This situation, we're looking at the tail end of the game, where if this call is called properly, they're put well within field goal range, given the first down, and it just did not materialize for whatever reason. And they don't even need that field goal. It was a minute, 50 left on the clock.

And Georgia's Drake has no timeouts. You're in victory formation at that. Game's over. Yeah. Yeah, well, that's even worse. I'm sorry, that's even worse. The game was over. It was a terrible call.

But again, that's what I mean in terms of it's not fair to say, hey, you have to be so much better than your opponent. You can eliminate any amount of variance. from the rules. Don't get me wrong. I'm a proponent of changing multiple rules as they stand now to kind of get the refs show out of the situation in terms of holding in terms of defense of passenger affairs, offensive pass and offense in terms of targeting. I'm in favor of changing multiple rules to make it clearer, planner, and easier for everybody. But you've got to enforce what's on the books as it is. And that didn't happen, which costs away for us, a massive

upset. You know, Kent, it's funny you mentioned that because, you know what's not clear? went to overtime. The game went to overtime. Is Wake Forest not allowed to win in overtime? They were not going to overtime, but it's a number one. It shouldn't have to. It's another way. Look, I agree.

But at the same time, Wake Forest is given countless opportunities to win this game outside of officiating. I am never going to blame officiating on a team losing games because there are plenty of other factors within your control that cost you a game. It is what it is with bad officiating. It's just going to happen. You should go into every game expecting that you're going to get screwed by the refs.

That just should be your mindset. We're going to get screwed by the refs. It is what it is. How can we fight through it? How can we continue to play through it? Wake Forest did not have to lose the game in overtime after that because they got the second life, which was the overtime. And they blew it then too.

So I don't have sympathy for them. Yep. But Kenton says, you know what's nice is when we can define rules more clearly. Morgan, here's my question for you. What on earth is a catch? Because down in this Florida State game, apparently we can't figure out what is a catch and what's not a catch. It costs Florida State in double overtime. Thankfully, at least we got some transparency on this one, right? We go inside the booth basically with the ACC. They all determine and say together doesn't have control until he's out of bounds. Morgan, was it a catch? Was it not? Was Florida State screwed on this?

Obviously, they still would have had to complete a two-point conversion to get more opportunities. What do you think? So far this year, I like when it's not a catch because LSU would have scored seven more points on Clemson if it was actually a catch. You know, it seems as if they've made this new rule that you have to maintain for five minutes after you cross the goal line. If you're a wide receiver, maybe if you're running back or quarterback, you don't have to. But if you're a wide receiver, you have to maintain, go get water, and then you can release the ball to the, ball boy or girl. When you have a Duke, when you have the Duke guy joining you on the referee complaints, that's when you know the world is upside down at this point. So JJ, sorry about

that one. It's all good. You know, I actually, I get where you coming from, Jackson, but I have to disagree because when it comes to, you know, a blatant off sides like that one was, I mean, he might as well have been signing an autograph with the running back in the backfield. I mean, that was really bad. And so when you have something like that, you know, I don't know who's more blind. Clemson's position coaches or the referees in the ACC right now. It's kind of, you know, neither one of them really know what's going on on the field. But, you know, that one really frustrated me that the deuce, is it Deuce Robinson?

You know, that catch from him, which he is. By the way, he's got to be on our all-ACC team, if not already, right? I mean, he's great. But I would say it did seem as if he was a victim of the tuck, you know? It was kind of like, what was it, Des Bryant, victim of the tuck or whoever it was in the NFL, if I'm remembering that right. But it seemed as if he had control and he was trying to transition to a tuck. and it, you know, when you slow things down, it, it was moving, but it, to me, at some point, it was moving under control.

But I can, I can also see where they would have an argument there. That one wasn't the egregious one to me. The one with Wake was, though. Yeah, completely agreed. All right, boys, we need to keep moving here. But there's more to talk about. Louisville has a massive comeback against Pitt. It wasn't just Georgia Tech.

We got to find out what's going on in Raleigh at Raleigh. Apparently Kenton's telling us, man, there's some people out for Coach Doran's head. We got to figure out what's going on there. We got to look ahead to this massive showdown in Tallahassee, gang, all of that coming up in just a second. Right after I tell you about Fanduil, y'all, the NFL season is here and Fandul has an offer you don't want to miss. Right now, new customers can bet just $5 and get $300 in bonus bets if you win. That's right. Pick a bet, put down five bucks.

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of them run on Square, which is a proud partner of more than four million neighborhood businesses all around the world. You can go to square.com slash go slash locked on college to learn more. But before you do, go support your favorite neighborhood spot. You're going to be happy you did. Square. See you in the neighborhood. All right, fellas, let's go to the Louisville game here where they're playing up at Pitt. And we've talked about Louisville as another potential team that could rise to the top of this conference, but we didn't really know yet who they are. They get into a bad situation where they were down 17 to nothing. They were down 27 to 17 at the half.

And we had this weird punt situation that really kick started things for them where we get a late fair kick signal from the pit punt returner. The Louisville player is blocked into him. No kick catch interference because he was blocked into him. The punt returner sticks his handout,

touches the ball. Louisville falls on it. Louisville ball. They go on to win this game. Fellas, for those of you that saw it, Was this, like, Louisville benefiting from another bad call, or was this just an odd situation adjudicated correctly? I'd have to say it's the latter or not the former. This was an odd situation that was adjudicated correctly.

And this is, now, this is one where I'll say you had a million chances outside of this. You know, Narduzzi is Narduzzi. He shows us the best of coaching. He shows us the best of coaching and the worst of coaching all in one game. He shows you the coaching that gets up 17. know. He shows you the coaching that shuts down Duke Watson and Isaac Brown. He shows you all that. And then to allow a 17-point comeback in this game. You know, it's so, I don't understand how Pitt fans are not living in a constant state of agony and terror at the idea that you know your

coach can win any game. He just doesn't. He just doesn't do it. He can put together a defensive scheme to stop any offense. And then all of a sudden, it always falls apart down the stress. I honestly look at this situation to say it was a properly adjudicated call, but if I am part of the pit faithful, I'm sitting up here scratching my head saying, how, how if you would have told anybody coming into this game that the best running back duo in the conference

and maybe even in the country outside of Happy Valley is going to be held to 67 yards. And Miller Moss is going to have to throw the ball 50 times. You say, yeah, I'm comfortable with that. And we're going to have a 17-point lead. I feel great about that. And Eli Holstein gets pulled in the middle of this game, boys. That was where I was like, what?

That's that overcoaching you're talking about there. Kenton. Did that feel weird to anybody else than me? Apparently not. Okay. I was just going to say, I will say it was strange because Eli Holstein has always been the guy that I thought stirs the drink for Pitt. And I understand.

He's had a rough go of it this season. He's had a very rough go of it. He's made some terrible reads. He's made some bad mistakes. me, if he's your guy, you have got to ride it out with him and at least, you know, let the game go. And on the next week, say, hey, listen, I can't start you. Not what you're making decisions like this.

We can't do it. But again, to pull him when you did, it just, it's a Narduzzi master class on, he's the tale of two cities in every game. He's the best of times. He's the worst of times all in every game. All right. We're talking about all these referee situations. One of the things that was great was in that Florida State game in Virginia,

we were treated to an inside look at what they were saying as they go under the hood and they're trying to make these calls. JJ, Morgan, do you guys like that level of transparency or would you rather than just figured out and let us know? It was so cool. I mean, I never thought that we'd get to a day that we get to see things like this, but to kind of hear them think out decisions as they're being made, the ball, whether or not they've got full control back and forth and that sort of thing.

I was certainly a big fan of it. And I honestly love to hear an argument for anybody against it because I think this is something that should be adopted by a lot of people. If you're just looking for transparency, if we're being so harsh on officiating in sports, why not let you see the breakdown process of how these decisions ultimately get made? Yeah, I enjoyed it because one thing that was shocking to me was that just the lack of knowledge that it was happening from the coaching staff. You know, when we asked Davo, when we asked Tom Allen,

I mean, they had no idea that they were implementing that. So it really wasn't like something that was for them, you know, and it really isn't. It's for us. So it does make you feel good that they're advancing certain things for the betterment of the fan base in the ACC and across college football. So I do like the transparency there. but as Kenson mentioned, you have all this great stuff with this transparency, but then, you know, like Pitt fans, I mean, they, they literally had, I don't know what the final penalties were between them and Louisville, but I mean, it was like Louisville got no holding calls and Pitt got all the, everything was holding for them.

So, you know, I can understand where Pitt fans are very frustrated by the, by just the imbalance. of just the regular calls, not even just the controversial calls. It just seems like right now ACC is doing a really good job at those, you know, reviewable calls, but then the regular ones you can't review, it's like they're all over the place. That's a good word. Okay. Here's one last place I want to go before we look ahead.

And Kenton, I'm sorry to have to make you revisit this, but dude, we got to ask what happened in Raleigh, right? We've got Virginia Tech fires their coach. Actually, I'm not going to laugh. they knock off Woff for the week after that. Like is this a moment of Virginia Tech just circling the wagons because things are weird? Is it NC State trying to figure out who that? Like what just what's happening?

To quote the legendary BB King, the thrill is gone. Any excitement, any juice, any support that Coach Doran had from the fan base, even the most sunshine of sunshine crew people in terms of the folks who are always, whatever happens, I've got Dave going back. they can no longer do it because this is an untenable loss. This is the type of loss that is the nail in a proverbial coffin because it just is. How do you excuse? Here's a fun fact about this game, okay?

Virginia Tech scored 23, or I'm sorry, yes, they scored 23 points in this game. NC State scores 21. Do you know how many other FBS teams Virginia Tech has held below 24 this season? I'm going to say zero. Zero. Correct. Zero. They allow 24 and then 44 and then 45 to Old Dominion.

You're telling me, and mind you, that is a generous 45 because I watched that game and I watched Old Dominion pull their foot off the gas and pull the boot out of their, you know what? That, I saw it. I watched them say, oh, yeah, we. Enough. Enough is enough. In Blacksburg. And they come into your house.

And they win this game. This is, I remember when they punted the ball before the end of the game, a guy sitting next to me was covering this from a Virginia Tech angle. And he said, man, I'm worried. I'm worried about this. And I said, you shouldn't be. You shouldn't be. I mean, the reality is this was as uninspired of a performance as I have ever seen from a

Dorncoast team. you let a skeleton crew of Virginia Tech come in and be it because they had three of their top six tacklers out. They had multiple key players out. And yet and still, Wofford ran the ball for more yards against them. The mighty Wofford Terriers. The Terriers outrust you against this defense. So do you get what you get when you show up, underwhelming, and all that?

And I said this on Lockthor and Wolfpack, and I'll say it here again. The media room is right next to the Wolves' Den, which is all. Also in Bon Towers, which is where all of the cool kids, all the people with big money, the people who's got their names on buildings and all that around campus, where those people sit during the game. And I can tell you, some of the things that were ringing out of that room, with all due respect, there's no way door comes back next year. And he was already planning on that of his own volition, right? Before this, it kind of sounds like. Now he's going to be asked to. Well, I was just about to say there was some speculation as to whether or not because he had.

hadn't made a formal statement on it. And technically there is formally no agreement that he's not coming back. However, I happen to know something about college football. When the people that open up their wallets and give the buckets say we're done, you're done. Those two things happen all at once. I'm looking at NC State's schedule right now and here's how killer of a loss this actually was. You're going to beat Campbell next week. So you're going to be four and two. then you end the season at home against North Carolina. You could probably beat North Carolina at home, although after seeing what happened against Virginia Tech,

that might be a point flip now. The remaining games besides those two, at Notre Dame, at Pitt, Georgia Tech at home, at Miami, Florida State at home. Woof. Oh, boy. So now find me the one win that you need to make a ball there.

If you had just beaten Virginia Tech at home, we'd be sitting here looking at NC State, and I know it might not mean that much because Dave Doran's in his billionth year with the program by now, but at least you can say, okay, we beat Virginia Tech. Even if we lose all these games that we have coming up, we'll beat Campbell, we'll be 5 and 1, and then all we have to do is beat North Carolina at the end of the year our rival, and you have six wins and you're a bowl team. Now all of a sudden I look at it and say, where's the sixth win coming from? from. But the thing is, I predicted before this season, this team would either win five or less or

eight or more. I knew it all offseason based on this first stance of the season. I said, this is not going to be an exactly six or seven win team, as we've seen a million times with NC State. This is going to be a year where things either go swimmingly well and we're all sitting up there like, wait, what? Or it's going to be very bad. And, you know, we're going to be saying, hey, Dave, it's been real, it's been fun, but it ain't been real fun. You got to go. And it's, it's turning out to be the latter. But in NC State's defense, I will say this. Half of the teams you just named either lost last week or had a very

unimpressive showing last week. So more of those games than not are very winnable. It's possible they win it. The problem is, which NC State team do you get? Do you get the one to beat Virginia? Or do you get the one that, you know, Virginia Tech is just too much? And we didn't know who the game plan for. That's a real quote from Coach Doran, by the way.

They had so many guys out. who the game plan for. Well, didn't know who to game plan for? That's what he said. That's what he said. I don't know what we're doing that for you. Speaking of Virginia,

they are at Louisville in a suddenly very meaningful game this Saturday. Obviously, we got the showdown in Tallahassee. We got the Desperation Bowl in Chapel Hill, North Carolina between the Tar Heels and Clemson. Let's just quick run through of the other results from this past weekend. Duke romps up at Syracuse, Cal edged BC up in Boston,

and Stanford. Way to go, Cardinal. You survived San Jose State at home by one, and they needed a fourth and ten in the last minute of the game to help accomplish that. Wow, that's gross. We're going to get to this week's action and rankings update all coming up here in just a second. Right after I tell you about Mazda, who crafts cars for those who do more than simply move, Mazda delivers confidence with every ride, with more IIHS top safety pick plus awards than anyone else as of August 2025. From footwork to breathwork, athletes sweat all the details. Mazda bring this same level of intentionality to how they craft every single model. You can feel that incredible Japanese craftsmanship in every detail, from the metallic accents to the available Napa leather upholstery. And with all-wheel drive standard in every crossover SUV,

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You're trying to go to Miami at Florida State Saturday night, see Donno maybe? It's the cheapest. I can find it, 261 to get in the door. But that's lower level. Section 113 row 62, man, you don't want to miss this game. So take the guesswork out of buying college football tickets with game time. Download the app, create an account, and use code locked on college for $20 off your first purchase. Again, that's promo code locked on college for $20 off. Terms applied. Swipe, tap, ticket, go. Download game time today. Okay, we've got another great Saturday of football coming up. Thursday or Friday games in the ACC this weekend. But man, things are going to start at noon and go all the way through a 1030 kick out on the West Coast. JJ, I hope you're getting a nap in now for Duke at Cal. We got to start with the biggest game of the week, though. It's the ABC Saturday night game, but it ain't game day.

You know where game day is, boys? Vandy at Alabama. Oh my goodness. Okay. But we got number three Miami at number 18 FSU. Neither Alex Dono nor Brian Smith are here to help us get this game ready. Man, 730 Eastern on ABC. Is FSU going to rebound or is Miami going to keep things rolling?

Jackson, what do you see? I see a team in Florida State that had one job. And that was to hold up their end of the bargain, beat Virginia, and both these teams would be undefeated. And this would be a matchup versus two top five teams in the country. That's what I think. That's what I saw. And when Florida State lost to Virginia, I said,

I honestly don't really think it's going to impact how they play against Miami no matter what. What it really tells me is this Florida State team is super Jekyll and Hyde. And that maybe it was just a helmet type game. Brian Smith actually taught me that reference. A helmet game where you look at the team's helmet, you see Virginia and you think you're just going to cakewalk your way to a victory. and then lo and behold, you lose. But now Florida State is playing Miami.

They're going to see them on the schedule and say, oh, boy, that's a tough game. Oh, no. They're top five in the country in Miami. We got to be on our A game. We got to play like we did against Alabama. It really comes down to whether or not if Florida State can hold up up front. That's what it is. Miami might have the best front, both sides in the country.

Good luck, Florida State. If Florida State can manage to get through that front, they have a chance. Thomas Castiano's, he can make plays with his legs. Still don't really trust him throwing the ball, but he can make plays with his legs. He can maybe catch Miami off balance, but it really just starts up front. And Florida State, they're going to have to be able to hold their own. They don't have to necessarily, quote unquote, win the trenches, but they can't lose it by so much of a margin where it's just overwhelming.

In Miami can just ram the ball right down their throats. and then on the other side, Florida State can't establish any sort of running game whatsoever. See, Jackson likes to get real philosophical enbloviate about things you don't need to talk that long about. One of these teams has Ruben Hurricane Bain, one of them don't. The team with him is going to win this ball game because he's an absolute game record supreme. And if you want to beat Miami, you've got to have a lot of pieces where we can win at all these other places. I don't think Florida State has that. give me the team with Hurricane Bain.

Give me the Cains. I just can't wait to watch it. I'm going to be a college football fan as this unfolds. I'm hopeful that we get a really impressive game here. So impressed by what Florida State has been able to do offensively. And to Jackson's point, we really missed out on an undefeated versus undefeated showdown when this game came around and went out.

We saw Florida State drop the ball. I'm also really fired up to hear this back and forth that we can have between you, Isaac and Morgan, ahead of, We got the tank ball. We're looking for the, uh, baby. We're looking forward to trying to, uh, get the first, uh, pick in the, in the, uh, college football draft in 2026. If that's the thing, I hope.

Um, I got to say, though, I never thought I'd be cheering for Carson Beck, but maybe, um, maybe I I am this weekend. I never thought I'd be cheering for Miami either. They don't need any more fans than they already have, but I will say, that, you know, it is crazy. Post-Cavender era Carson Begg with the Lamborghini and the money. He is actually, like, become free, you know. Maybe, maybe Kirby Smart is starting to become, maybe Kirby Smart is Dabo two years ago. Maybe Kirby Smart is falling away and forgetting how to coach. You know, he's just two years ahead or behind Dabo. I could see that because look at, Christopher,

And look at the players he's brought in. Maybe just maybe you just got to pay a quarterback that knows what they're doing. And if you pay them enough money, they just relax and they free up. And, you know, when they get the vitamin D of Miami, maybe it just works out. But the only thing I'll say is not only is this a rivalry game, I'm looking at, you know, I'm a pilot here. I'm looking at acuweather.com. And I'm seeing 80% chance of some storms here.

So when it gets to that, can you really rely on anything? I mean, who knows what kind of football you're going to? going to get when you're in a when you're if you have a lot of rain you to add to it can we call it a diluge is that appropriate hey speaking of quarterbacks that you can trust north carolina doesn't have one geo lopez is so bad doing the party yeah right well i'm joining the party right geo lope has got heard in the first game of the season against tc u and max johnson had come in and shown that he was able to actually move the team down the field and score what's called a touchdown, which is when you cross that line at the end of the field and you get six points.

That's what that actually is. North Carolina went right back to Geo Lopez. They've stuck with them for each of the past three games. He gets hurt again in that UCF embarrassment. And now it sounds like he's a little bit day to day, but has not been taking reps, not been able to play in practice. Once again, I've been calling over and over and over again for like, you've got to give Max Johnson a shot here to at least prove that he can do so.

can at least throw the ball, move it downfield, and get Carolina where they need to be. Not to mention what a cool story it is, him coming back from that bad injury last year. By the way, shouts to Tyreek Hill, that was gross. And so, for me, like,

I know that Carolina has not showed much of anything offensively, honestly, the best unit for the Tar Heels right now is special teams. And that ain't going to win you many football games, boys. So, I am a major advocate for Bill Belichick inserting Max John and whether or not Gio Lopez is healthy in this game and seeing what can happen.

Now, on the other side of the football, Morgan, are we ready to see like a Cade Clubnick step up and have a game? Is that going to happen? That's my question. I think we've got a better chance of having a punt off than that. But, you know, it's true what they say. When you have two left-handed quarterbacks, as North Carolina does, you really have no quarterback. But Clemson also is one of those teams that, you know, Cape Clubnick. If you're a wrestling fan out there and maybe you're not,

but this is my only reference here. You know, you've got Cody Rhodes and that's what you wanted. You wanted this beautiful, blonde Cody Rhodes with the, you know, the WWE Championship. That's what that's the Kade Club Nick you wanted, you know, with a nice little neck tattoo and everything. That's what you wanted. The face of your franchise. What you ended up getting in 2025 was Stardust, you know, with the gimmick and the face paint and the, you know,

and you didn't really want that at all. So what quarterback are you going to get in this situation? We don't really know. I mean, Davo came out today and said that basically it's a coaching failure. But, you know, for two weeks, I've been saying, you know, maybe they just don't attend practices. So maybe this week they actually were there at practice. We'll see.

There's only practice. Exactly. Hey, hey, Isaac, I got a theory for you. Hear me out. Okay, bring it. Okay. Bring it. The last time Bill Belichick put in a backup, and they had a lot of success, that backup got all the credit. And he's thinking, if I put in another backup, and this one got a bionic knee, too, he's a little bit cyborgish. If he had success, now they think in modern medicine and Max Johnson instead of me. I got you figured out, Chapel Bill. I'm in your hand, man. I know. I know. I know.

The Brooklyn Brady has a new chapter. Are you telling me that Max Johnson is on Brady right now? Is that what's about to happen? All I'm saying is this. Drew Bledso never got his job back. I don't think G.O. Lopez would ever get his back. Due to knowledge. I don't care. Do the knowledge.

I don't care how much money you paid the guy in the transfer portal. You got to win football games. And if somebody else is going to help you do that more capably, you got to make it. Kent, I want to stay with you, Kent. What if they're getting his contract that he has to start? Because aren't some players making demands about how they have to start with an IL contracts? It's technically not pay for play. So they might have a deal with a certain advertiser for that,

but that's that has no bearings on the coach's decision because it's not pay for play. It's not from the university person. No. But I remember there was, I forgot who the player was. He entered the transfer portal last year and it came out online that he had a whole list of demands. And one of the demands was I want guaranteed exercise. them out of playing time. So I'm wondering if that might be in someone's contract.

If it is in someone's contract, then. Again, not even George Hudson would be that. Okay, like, come on. All right. And one other game I want to hit on here, number 24, Virginia at Louisville, 3.30 Eastern on ESPN2. In some ways, Kent, this feels to me like maybe an ACC championship elimination game. Is that a maybe fair way to look at this game?

Absolutely, because of coastal chaos. Let's be very honest here, right? Virginia is technically undefeated in conference, despite the fact that they lost to NC State earlier this season. And so is Louisville, also undefeated in conference, despite the fact that Louisville has put together no performances outside of this last one that would inspire confidence in them. I believe that the right team is favorite. I'm not sure if they cover this spread. I don't know if they cover that spread with both of their backs being banged up, but I do think they have enough. in the tank to beat UVA, especially because UVA has a number by their name for the first time since what,

Kevin Jones was walking through that locker room. It's been a while. So I think that I would probably lean towards Louisville in this one, but, you know, no outcome would surprise me all that much here. Louisville is six and a half point favorite in that game. Going to be interesting to see. JJ's excited. He's going to get to see the whole Miami at Florida State game that kicks off at 730 because his game's not till 1030 Duke at Cal on ESPN. This is the we've got games literally all day in the conference, and that is the prime example of it. Syracuse is down in Tallas at SMU 330 on ACCC Network, Wake Forest at Virginia Tech at one on CW, right after like a Dawson's Creek rerun, something like that. And then Campbell at NC State, we talked about earlier, 2 p.m. on ESPN Plus.

So it's going to be another interesting weekend of ACC football. Thanks so much to everyone for joining us here today. for Jackson Holzer from Locked on Syracuse, Kenton Gibbs from Lockdown Wolfpack, our guy Morgan Thomas from Locked on Clemson and of course, JJ Jackson from Lockedon Blue Devils. I'm Isaac Shade, host of Lockdown Tar Hills. It's been great to be together here with you today. Hope you have a great weekend. Enjoy football.

And until next week when we're back together again, right here on the squad. Peace.