Wednesday morning the Atlantic Coast Conference held its weekly coaches teleconference. North Carolina coach Larry Fedora took questions from reporters on this weekend’s game against James Madison. Later in the day, James Madison coordinators and assistant coaches held their media availability after the team’s practice at Bridgeforth Stadium in Harrisonburg.

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- Fedora had plenty of praise for James Madison’s rushing attack. JMU rushed for more than 800 yards in its first two games. Fedora said Madison is similar in scheme to what North Carolina does and is executing at a high level. On the 800-plus rushing yards, Fedora added, “I don’t care if you’re playing against air, that’s hard to do.”

- The Tar Heels have given up an average of 235 rushing yards per game. Fedora said JMU’s rushing attack would “challenge” UNC’s defense. He said JMU has run the ball “at will” against its opponents.

- UNC played in a marquee opener at the Chick-Fil-A Kickoff Game in Atlanta and then went to Illinois, another Power Five opponent in Week 2. When Fedora was asked if his team would have any let down against an FCS team, he said “there is always danger of it.” The fifth-year Tar Heels coach added his staff and players don’t change their approach based on the opponent and that he’d hope his team is taking JMU seriously.

- Fedora said he thinks JMU coach Mike Houston is “a really good football coach.” Fedora said Houston has done a phenomenal job of adjusting to the talent level of personnel that he has. Last year, Houston ran a totally different offense at The Citadel and Fedora said for Houston to arrive at JMU, look at the personnel that he would have, change his approach and then have success, shows that the first-year Madison coach is a good one.

- JMU offensive coordinator Donnie Kirkpatrick coached against North Carolina a few times while he was at East Carolina. He said since he last faced the Tar Heels, UNC changed its defense under second-year coordinator Gene Chizik. UNC is now running a 4-2-5 system similar to JMU’s defense.

- Kirkpatrick said he very familiar with most of North Carolina’s personnel because he recruited against Fedora’s staff and tried to land some of the current Tar Heels. He said UNC gets most recruits it wants, since it is the premier program in the state.

- What concerns Kirkpatrick is that UNC hasn’t faced anyone similar on offense to JMU yet, so he said he doesn’t know how the Tar Heels will try to defend against the Dukes. Georgia and Illinois are both power football teams, so the JMU offensive staff hasn’t had much to go off of in regards to what Carolina’s first two opponents tried to do offensively.

- Last winter, UNC played against Baylor at the Russell Athletic Bowl. Without a quarterback, Baylor ran for 645 yards against the Tar Heels. Kirkpatrick said JMU’s staff was able to learn from the tape of the bowl game.

- Wide receivers coach Drew Dudzik also coached against North Carolina last fall when he was at Duke. UNC beat Duke 66-31. Dudzik said, “They got after us a little bit.” Like Kirkpatrick, he’s familiar with the personnel. Dudzik added UNC is extremely deep.

- Defensive coordinator Bob Trott graduated from North Carolina in 1976. It’s not his first time back to Chapel Hill since – he’s coached against UNC a few times – but he said the town is a great place where he has a lot of ties. He added his main focus is the game though. “I’m only worried about the game,” he said.

- Against Central Connecticut State, junior linebacker Brandon Hereford started in place of an injured Gage Steele. Trott came away impressed with Hereford, he said. Hereford made 12 tackles last week and could see more playing time this week against the Tar Heels.

- Special teams coordinator John Bowers said he thinks the effort of his punt return team is what’s enabled it to have so much success. He said return man Rashard Davis has been great, but pointed out that Curtis Oliver and Jimmy Moreland have emerged as key blockers to spring Davis.

- Bowers said on Davis’ punt return score against Central Connecticut State that Oliver blocked a would-be tackler for 10 seconds while Davis raced down the sideline. He added Moreland has blocked two opposing players on each of the punt return scores.