The North Carolina football team will take the field one final time this season at 2 p.m. in the Hyundai Sun Bowl against Stanford. The No. 18 Cardinal (9-3, 6-3 Pac-12) comes into the game on a five-game winning streak — with its last loss coming in October against No. 10 Colorado — while the Tar Heels (8-4, 5-3 ACC) dropped their past two games against FBS foes.
The big news coming into the bowl game was that junior running back Christian McCaffrey would be sitting out the Sun Bowl to prepare for the NFL Draft. The Stanford star rushed for over 1,600 yards this season after setting the NCAA single-season all-purpose yardage record a season ago — so in some ways, North Carolina's abysmal rush defense dodged a bullet by not having to worry about facing him.