{"id":299746,"date":"2026-10-04T20:14:45","date_gmt":"2026-10-04T20:14:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/299746\/"},"modified":"2026-10-04T20:14:45","modified_gmt":"2026-10-04T20:14:45","slug":"no-25-pittsburgh-takes-on-north-carolina-in-acc-action","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/299746\/","title":{"rendered":"No. 25 Pittsburgh takes on North Carolina in ACC action"},"content":{"rendered":"

North Carolina (2-2) at No. 25 Pittsburgh (5-0), Oct. 10 at 12 p.m. EDT.<\/p>\n

Opening Line: Pittsburgh by 3.5. Against the spread: Pittsburgh 4-1, North Carolina 2-2.<\/p>\n

How to watch: ESPN<\/p>\n

Key stats<\/p>\n

Pittsburgh Offense<\/p>\n

Overall: 478.0 yards per game (23rd in FBS)<\/p>\n

Passing: 316.0 yards per game (10th)<\/p>\n

Rushing: 162.0 yards per game (64th)<\/p>\n

Scoring: 38.4 points per game (24th)<\/p>\n

Pittsburgh Defense<\/p>\n

Overall: 295.4 yards per game (30th in FBS)<\/p>\n

Passing: 239.8 yards per game (110th)<\/p>\n

Rushing: 55.6 yards per game (2nd)<\/p>\n

Scoring: 13.4 points per game (12th)<\/p>\n

North Carolina Offense<\/p>\n

Overall: 345.8 yards per game (109th in FBS)<\/p>\n

Passing: 210.3 yards per game (89th)<\/p>\n

Rushing: 135.5 yards per game (100th)<\/p>\n

Scoring: 24.0 points per game (98th)<\/p>\n

North Carolina Defense<\/p>\n

Overall: 353.0 yards per game (69th in FBS)<\/p>\n

Passing: 200.5 yards per game (60th)<\/p>\n

Rushing: 152.5 yards per game (89th)<\/p>\n

Scoring: 19.5 points per game (43rd)<\/p>\n

North Carolina is 71st in third down percentage, converting 40.9% of the time. Pittsburgh ranks 20th on defense, allowing its opponents at convert at 29.0%.<\/p>\n

North Carolina ranks 75th in the FBS with a -1 turnover margin, compared to Pittsburgh’s 14th-ranked +5 margin.<\/p>\n

Pittsburgh is 127th in the FBS averaging 79.4 penalty yards per game, compared to North Carolina’s 4th-ranked 28.8 per-game average.<\/p>\n

Pittsburgh is 68th in FBS in red zone offense, scoring on 86.4% of trips. North Carolina’s red zone defense ranks 9th at 69.2%.<\/p>\n

North Carolina ranks 122nd in the FBS with an average time of possession of 27:28, compared to Pittsburgh’s 39th-ranked average of 31:38.<\/p>\n

Team leaders<\/p>\n

Pittsburgh<\/p>\n

Passing: Mason Heintschel<\/a>, 1,304 yards, 14 TDs, 1 INT, 66.2 completion percentage<\/p>\n

Rushing: Damon Ferguson Jr<\/a>., 270 yards on 51 carries, 3 TDs<\/p>\n

Receiving: Cataurus Hicks<\/a>, 315 yards on 15 catches, 3 TDs<\/p>\n

North Carolina<\/p>\n

Passing: Billy Edwards Jr<\/a>., 819 yards, 6 TDs, 3 INTs, 57.5 completion percentage<\/p>\n

Rushing: Benjamin Hall<\/a>, 251 yards on 43 carries, 0 TDs<\/p>\n

Receiving: Jordan Shipp<\/a>, 273 yards on 20 catches, 0 TDs<\/p>\n

Last game<\/p>\n

Pittsburgh defeated Virginia Tech 35-33 on Oct. 2. Heintschel passed for 113 yards on 10-of-18 attempts (55.6%) with one touchdown and no interceptions. Ja’Kyrian Turner<\/a> carried the ball 14 times for 65 yards and scored one touchdown, adding six receptions for 35 yards. Hicks recorded 63 yards on three catches with two touchdowns.<\/p>\n

North Carolina lost 37-26 to Notre Dame on Oct. 3. Edwards led North Carolina with 208 yards on 17-of-28 passing (60.7%) for three touchdowns and two interceptions. Hall had 36 rushing yards on 10 carries. Shipp recorded 109 yards on seven catches.<\/p>\n

Next game<\/p>\n

Pittsburgh plays at Boston College on Oct. 17. North Carolina plays at Duke on Oct. 17.<\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2026 ESPN Internet Ventures. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"North Carolina (2-2) at No. 25 Pittsburgh (5-0), Oct. 10 at 12 p.m. EDT. Opening Line: Pittsburgh by…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":299747,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[123532,6743,1421,20097,73,75,74,17935],"class_list":["post-299746","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pittsburgh","tag-123532","tag-college-football","tag-espn","tag-north-carolina-tar-heels","tag-pittsburgh","tag-pittsburgh-headlines","tag-pittsburgh-news","tag-pittsburgh-panthers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/299746","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=299746"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/299746\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/299747"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=299746"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=299746"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=299746"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}