Soobum Im-USA TODAY Sports We finally have an answer at quarterback...for now. We are one big step closer to knowing what UNC will look like when they take the field against South Carolina in under two weeks. After an entire offseason of evaluation, Mack Brown and his staff have finally found a little bit of separation at the quarterback position. Brown told the media this afternoon that four-star freshman Sam Howell will be practicing with the first team from this point forward. Mack Brown says Sam Howell will start taking snaps with the Blue Team (first team). “Sam has just been more consistent than the other two.”— Pat James (@patjames24) August 18, 2019 The assessment of Howell’s skills falls in line with what the staff has been saying up to this point: Jace Ruder’s strong suit was running, Cade Fortin was viewed as the strongest passer, and Howell fell right in the middle, though was slightly behind both players in their respective strengths. The combination of these two attributes, however, is likely what helped Brown make the decision to have Howell practice with the first team. Now that the Heels have finally found someone who will consistently practice with the starters, they should now be able to focus on getting everyone to gel on the field. Will everyone be on the same page by the time they square off with South Carolina? Or will this decision coming so late hamper cohesiveness in Mack Brown’s first game back? We will have answers to these questions and more in just a matter of weeks.

Photo by Peyton Williams/Getty Images After two years of needing to play home games away from home, Tar Heel Soccer is back in Chapel Hill Home games for UNC soccer have been a bit of a headache the last couple of years, as Fetzer Field on the UNC campus was undergoing a drawn-out renovation that, predictably, made it impossible to play on. Both the men and the women toured the North Carolina Triangle for their home games, most of them in Cary, North Carolina’s WakeMed Park but also making stops in Greensboro, Bryan Park, and (gag) Durham’s Koskinen Stadium. As you can imagine, having to play home games half an hour to an hour and a half away, sometimes in rivals’ stadiums and almost always closer to rival turf than the team’s own, put a fair damper on home-field advantage for the men and women, who put together an excellent couple of seasons regardless of being unable to play in front of most of the students who make up a significant portion of their home audience. The wait is over and the soccer fields have finished their renovations, and the Tar Heel men christened the new facility on Thursday with their first exhibition game. And they made it an opener to enjoy, beating Stetson 4-1. Freshman Cameron Fisher scored a brace after being subbed on in the second half, making him a new player to watch for the upcoming season for sure. But the scoring was opened by a couple of veterans as junior Lucas Del Rosario drew a penalty and senior Mauricio Pineda tapped in the rebound after the Stetson keeper blocked his attempt from the spot, and from there the floodgates were opened. UNC took a 3-0 lead before Stetson got one back, and Fisher’s second was just icing.. They’ll play their second home exhibition tonight, against tougher competition: N.C. State comes to town ahead of UNC’s Fall Fest event to open the semester, which makes for some sweet irony after UNC spent most of its home games about a 5-minute drive from the NCSU campus the last two years. Hopefully, they can keep up the good vibes from the newly minted stadium on UNC’s campus running through tonight for a sweet exhibition win over a rival and into the 2019 season. Go Heels!