No. 24 North Carolina and Duke meet in their long-running rivalry for the Victory Bell

It wasn't that long ago that Saturday night's rivalry matchup between No. 24 North Carolina and Duke seemed set to give the winner a push toward the Atlantic Coast Conference championship game.

Instead, the Tar Heels are trying to regroup from two losses, while the Blue Devils are grinding through multiple key injuries that has hindered their momentum from earlier this season.

UNC (7-2, 3-2 ACC) is coming off a win against Championship Subdivision opponent Campbell, which had followed the Tar Heels' slide from a No. 10 national ranking to unranked after losses to Virginia and Georgia Tech. Now they're preparing for the rival Blue Devils (6-3, 3-2) in their home finale, followed by trips to Clemson and North Carolina State to close the regular season.

“We didn't get any favors with the schedule," coach Mack Brown said. "We're going to have to be really tough mentally and physically to be able to handle this three-game stretch.”

Duke is just battling to push through November. Dual-threat quarterback Riley Leonard suffered an ankle injury late in the Notre Dame loss that sidelined him one game, and he was hobbled even after his return in losses to Florida State and Louisville.

Ultimately, he didn't play in last week's narrow win against Wake Forest, with former third-stringer Grayson Loftis taking over and being in line to start against UNC. There's also been injuries to linemen Graham Barton and Jacob Monk in that time.

“I'm sure being down five or six players due to injury nine weeks into the season is not an overly large number,” Duke coach Mike Elko said. “But I think that given the magnitude of who it is, I think it probably feels a little different.”

MAYE'S HOME FINALE?

Brown has long said that this is likely Drake Maye’s final college season as a top NFL prospect. So that could mean this is his final home game as a Tar Heel.

Maye told reporters earlier this week that he hasn't decided about his plans for next year. But he seemed to lean against walking for Senior Day festivities, saying: "I think Senior Day personally is meant for seniors."

For his part, Brown said he thinks “it's absolute” that Maye will enter the NFL draft.

“I think it would be cool for him to walk out there for everybody to say thank you,” Brown said.

OPPORTUNITY

Duke has been productive all season on the ground behind Jordan Waters (564 yards, 10 touchdowns) and Jaquez Moore (481 yards, four TDs). That duo could be set up for a quality day against a UNC run defense that has faded in recent losses.

Virginia came in as one of the Bowl Subdivision's worst rushing teams but ran for 228 yards, then Georgia Tech ran for 246 fourth-quarter yards.

RIVALRY CLAIM

The winner of the long-running series gets the Victory Bell, a cart carrying a former railroad engine bell used in the rivalry since 1948. The winner typically paints the cart its shade of light or dark blue, with the winning players running to claim and ring it the moment the clock expires.

SERIES HISTORY

UNC has won all four meetings in Mack Brown’s second coaching tenure with the Tar Heels, including last year on a final-seconds touchdown and in 2019 on a late defensive stop.

Duke hasn’t beaten a Brown-coached UNC team since an infamous 41-0 road win in 1989 that ended with Steve Spurrier’s Blue Devils taking a team photo in front of the scoreboard afterward during Brown’s first tenure in Chapel Hill.

TOUGH SLATE

This is Duke's fifth game against an AP Top 25 team this year. The Blue Devils beat preseason ACC favorite Clemson to open the year, but have lost to Notre Dame, FSU and Louisville since.

This is the first time the Blue Devils have played five ranked opponents in the same season since 1993.

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