North Texas pulls away from Charlotte. What we learned from another 49ers loss

The Charlotte 49ers were on the brink of pulling out a season-changing upset through three quarters against North Texas (7-1, 3-1 American), but a dreadful fourth quarter brought Tim Albin’s upset hopes crashing down, losing 54-20 in a Friday night blowout.

For the first time this season, Charlotte (1-7, 0-5 American) held a second-half lead against an FBS opponent, putting the American Conference championship-hopeful Mean Green on the ropes with an unexpected offensive explosion. But Drew Mestekmaker and North Texas’ high-flying offense wouldn’t be denied, turning a three-point deficit midway through the third quarter into a 34-point road victory, keeping their College Football Playoff hopes alive.

Mestemaker’s career day featured 608 yards through the air, breaking the North Texas program record, including dealing to three different receivers with 100-yard days, led by Wyatt Young’s 190 yards and a 70-yard touchdown to put the nail in Charlotte’s coffin.

Six straight Mean Green scoring drives sent the 49ers’ smallest home crowd of the season (9,629) to the exits early in the fourth quarter, as Mestemaker stayed in the game until the two-minute warning to break the record.

“I tip my hat to North Texas and their staff. One of the better offenses I’ve seen in my career. We knew it would be a huge challenge. Offensively, we just couldn’t put enough pressure on them to make it a game in the second half,” Albin said after the game. “For three quarters, we were right there. We told our guys all week that we’d have to take some chances. We’re disappointed in the fourth quarter, and it got out of hand.”

What was Charlotte’s best game of the season completely crumbled in the game’s final 20 minutes. Trailing by seven points on their own 23-yard line, Albin called a fake punt, snapping the ball to the upback on fourth-and-11. The play was blown up, coming nowhere close to first down yardage, and the onslaught began.

“It was a numbers thing for us (on the fake punt). They had a spy. That’s how it went down,” Albin said of the fake. “Should I have done it – no. But our mindset going in was that we were going to be aggressive.”

Charlotte was going to have to pull out all the stops to score the upset as nearly four-touchdown underdogs coming into the game, and North Texas’ superior talent took over in the second half, turning what was a competitive game into Charlotte’s fifth-straight double-digit loss and second-straight by 30 or more points.

The craziest part — the 49ers led the game 20-17 with six minutes to play in the third quarter.

After retaking the lead with 8:19 to play in the third period, Charlotte would run 21 plays for 26 total yards to close the game. Five punts and a turnover on downs, coming on the fake punt. It was total offensive dominance from the Mean Green, combined with a complete meltdown for the 49ers.

Here are three takeaways from Charlotte’s seventh loss:

Competitive first half

There were plenty of fireworks in the first quarter, with both teams trading blows on chunk play touchdowns, dropped passes, and the 49ers’ first lead in over a calendar month. After struggling in every outing to this point, Loftis found his footing early in the action, finding Javen Nicholas on an option route on fourth down, and Nicholas did the rest, scampering 33 yards to put the 49ers out front for the first time since starting quarterback Conner Harrell suffered a season-ending injury (Week 4 against Rice, on Sept. 18).

Loftis would stay hot to open the second quarter, connecting with Nicholas again for the same result. Nicholas took the top off the Mean Green defense with a 64-yard score on Charlotte’s first play, putting the 49ers up 10 points midway through the second quarter.

It was one of the best moments of the season for the 49ers against FBS competition, but the season-long struggles reared their head, and Charlotte looked more like itself in the game’s final quarter. The Mean Green would rattle off 37 unanswered points in the game’s final 21 minutes, crushing any hopes of a respectable scoreboard.

The middle-eight (final four minutes of first half, first four minutes of second half) had been a teaching point for Albin all season, and the 49ers were much improved Friday night. With all the momentum swinging to the visitor’s sideline, North Texas was eyeing a two-for-one with the ball in Charlotte’s redzone, just 8 yards from retaking the lead late in the first half. Mestemaker forced a ball to the sideline, making his second mistake of the night, this time resulting in the game’s first turnover — with defensive end Yamil Talib recording his first career interception and sending the game to halftime tied at 17.

With 43 seconds on the clock and a timeout in his back pocket, Albin chose the conservative route, handing the ball off twice and forgoing a Hail Mary to send the game to the half knotted up.

“It was where we were field position-wise. The type of offense we’ve got with one timeout, I thought we’d play it safe,” Albin said. “I didn’t want to lose the game right there.”

While it wasn’t what cost Charlotte the game, the 49ers could’ve utilized the opportunity to take a lead to the break for the first time this season.

For the first time, Grayson Loftis played well

In a game that saw 903 passing yards between the two signal-callers, Loftis held his own in his second-straight start. For the first time since Harrell’s season-ending knee injury, a Charlotte quarterback started and finished a game, and Loftis likely put his stamp on the starting job for the rest of the season.

Loftis completed 20 of his 36 passes for 295 yards and two touchdowns, attacking the Mean Green defense on all three levels. For an offense that had struggled to generate the big play, Nicholas’ career day of 187 yards and two touchdowns on seven catches jump-started what was a lifeless offense the week prior against Temple.

“I thought this was probably Grayson’s best game. We protected decently at times. He got the ball out, wasn’t holding it, and moved when he had to,” Albin said. “We’ve got to have more production offensively, for sure.”

While far and away Lofits’ best game at the helm in green and white, it wasn’t without mistakes. Loftis tossed what could have been two interceptions, both of which were dropped by Mean Green defenders. The hot start dwindled in the second half, and after completing 10 of his first 14 passes, Loftis missed 12 of his next 22 passes, tapering off as the game got out of hand.

The 49ers did break their streak of seven-straight games with a turnover, holding onto the ball and winning the turnover battle (+2) for the first time.

Opportunistic 49ers defense, until it wasn’t

There aren’t often many positives when allowing well over 750 yards of total offense, but defensive coordinator Nate Faanes’ unit made timely plays for the first three quarters to keep the 49ers competitive.

“We didn’t have any turnovers tonight offensively for the first time all year. They had two. That’s very exciting, and something we’ve got to build on,” Albin said. “We’ve just got to get more consistent.”

Charlotte’s defense recorded consecutive takeaways – an interception of Mestemaker by Talib and a forced fumble by Collin Gill, keeping the game tied early in the third quarter.

But the timely takeaways and redzone stands to force field goals didn’t last, and Mestemaker began to shred Charlotte’s secondary, taking whatever he wanted in the second half.

On 14 total drives, the Mean Green averaged 51 yards per possession and produced nine scoring drives (seven touchdowns). The big plays came in bunches, totaling 20 chunk plays for 554 of their 754 yards.

Going into a much-needed bye week, the 49ers will have 15 days of preparation for the third meeting against East Carolina (4-3, 2-1 American). Charlotte is undefeated against the Pirates and will need a full 60 minutes of the version of the team that played in the first half to win.

Albin knows that Charlotte isn’t close to where he wants the program to be, and is hanging his hat on the 2026 recruiting class.

“The scores say (the talent gap) is big, but my 37 years of coaching say it’s not as big as the scores,” Albin said. “I’m hanging my hat on the recruiting class that we have committed. We all know you won’t be able to flip it and turn it around with all high school kids. We want to be 60% developmental, high school, and 40% transfers as a program. We’re going to get some resources, and this staff that I’ve been bragging on, we’ll be able to close that gap sooner than you think.”