NC State-UNC rivalry creates football memories, and should again
Garrett Bradbury well remembers N.C. State’s 35-7 win over North Carolina in 2014 in Chapel Hill.
“Hated it,” he said.
Not the Pack winning. Sitting. Bradbury was a freshman at N.C. State and not a member of the Pack’s travel squad for that UNC game.
“I was redshirting that year,” Bradbury said. “I was in the stands, which I hated. I was in the stands while the team was on the field. It was fun because we beat them up pretty bad but I was upset, being in the bleachers.”
Bradbury has been on the field and in the middle of things in the rivalry game the past three years, helping anchor the offensive line. The Pack has two straight victories over the Tar Heels including N.C. State’s win in 2016, when the Charlotte native returned to Kenan Stadium.
The Pack (7-3 overall, 4-3 ACC) will be gunning for three in a row in the series Saturday at Kenan. It will be “Senior Day” for the Tar Heels (2-8, 1-6) and a game played amidst building speculation about Larry Fedora’s future as UNC’s coach.
Two years ago, the speculation was all about N.C. State coach Dave Doeren going into the UNC game, and Doeren said this week the Pack’s 28-21 victory probably saved his job.
Winning the game marked a turning point in Doeren’s program, earning the Pack a berth in the Independence Bowl with a 6-6 record. The Pack blasted Vanderbilt in the bowl, then went 9-4 last season with a Sun Bowl win over Arizona State to finish 23rd in the final poll, earning Doeren a new five-year contract.
“Coach Doeren has continued to build a culture and the standard for this program,” said Bradbury, a graduate who was moved from guard to center as a junior. “People are seeing that. You’re starting to see it all come together and it didn’t happen at first. It’s definitely changing now.”
The Wolfpack has had three-game (or longer) winning streaks over UNC three times in the past 50 years -- the most recent the five straight victories from 2007 to 2011 under former coach Tom O’Brien. Dick Sheridan’s teams also won five in a row (1988-92) and Earle Edwards won three straight as the Pack’s coach from 1967 to 1969.
“That’s a good thing to have, beating your rival team three times,” said running back Reggie Gallaspy, a senior from High Point. “As a freshman we lost but we got after them ever since. But we’ve got to come out strong and put the rivalry in the back of our minds.”
Doeren never won a rivalry game in his days as a tight end at Drake, which still smarts.
“The Dayton Flyers were our rivals,” he said. “It was a huge game. Unfortunately I never beat them as a player but as a coach I was part of beating those guys and winning their first championship.”
That was in the Pioneer Football League. The Bulldogs were 8-1-1 in 1995, beating Dayton 34-23, when Doeren coached the linebackers as an assistant coach on Rob Ash’s staff.
“Any rivalry game means a lot, as a player and coach,” Doeren said.
Doeren said being a graduate assistant coach on the Southern California staff in 1998 and ‘99 helped prepare him for what was to come at N.C. State, where so many Wolfpack fans salivate over the thought of beating the Tar Heels.
“Having been a part of the USC-UCLA rivalry, I’ve been a part of something similar,” Doeren said. “Those are two universities in the same city limits.
“I anticipated it being like that here. My first press conference, people came up and welcomed me and mentioned ‘Beat Carolina,’ so it kind of cemented what I thought it would be.”
Doeren’s first taste of the rivalry wasn’t pleasant -- a 27-19 loss at Carter-Finley in 2013 -- and the Pack would lose again at Carter-Finley in 2015. But he’s 3-2 overall against the Tar Heels after the two wins in Chapel Hill and last year’s 33-21 victory at Carter-Finley.
The Wolfpack is favored to win Saturday, but that means little to Bradbury and his teammates. They see a UNC team capable of scoring points, a team that has some defensive playmakers and one that has played hard -- if not always well -- in many games this season.
“They’ve had a lot of close games but not finished them,” Bradbury said. “That’s encouraging for them because they know they’ve played well against everyone in the ACC and been right there.”