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| NC State one-year interim head coach Al Michaels on the sidelines at Kenan Stadium. |
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BY TIM PEELER, © 2024
While the story of Saturday’s 114th meeting between NC State and North Carolina will be a protracted farewell to departing Tar Heel head coach Mack Brown, having a lame duck leader is not exactly unprecedented in this rivalry that dates back to 1894 and has been played continuously since 1953.
There have been at least four previous games where one of the teams has been led by an interim or out-going leader.
The first time it happened was in 1930, one of the weirdest years in NC State football history, when kicked-in-the-head coach John Van Liew wandered off during a win over Mississippi State and never returned to the Wolfpack sidelines. He was replaced midway through the season by athletics director, trainer and basketball coach R.R. “Doc” Sermon, who lost the last four games of the season.
That included the Pack’s trip over to Chapel Hill to face the defending Southern Conference-champion Tar Heels. State was a five-touchdown underdog.
Thanks to a driving wind, the game was low-scoring, with the Tar Heels twice getting touchdowns set up by weak NC State punts. The Wolfpack scored its only points on a 60-yard interception return by Sam Gurneau and nearly tied the game with a 70-yard kickoff return that ultimately ended up as a four-play turnover on downs at the UNC 14-yard-line.
It was an unexpectedly close game, with the Tar Heels taking a 13-6 victory, suggesting that fully employed coaches aren’t necessarily needed to make game in this rivalry close and exciting.
The Wolfpack was playing for another interim coach in 1971, when legendary mentor Earle Edwards retired just before the beginning of the season and was replaced by longtime defensive coordinator Al Michaels, who was given a season-long try-out as head coach.
Michaels, Edwards’ top assistant and fast friend since coming to NC State in 1954, was not as successful in the head-coaching chair as he was running Edwards’ defense. The Pack went 3-8 on the season and finished sixth in the seven-team ACC.
That included a 27-7 loss in Raleigh on Oct. 2 to the eventual league-champion Heels, who were a perfect 6-0 in conference action under fifth year coach Bill Dooley that season.
Wolfpack athletics director Willis Casey decided early during the season that he would hire an up-and-coming young coach from William & Mary to take over as head coach, Lou Holtz. Michaels returned to his defensive coordinator position under Holtz for another three years.
With two games remaining in the 2006 season, North Carolina athletics director Dick Baddour announced that UNC-CH grad John Bunting would not be retained as head coach after losing seven consecutive games. Bunting had a lively rivalry with NC State alum Chuck Amato, especially on the in-state recruiting trail. The two exchanged heated barbs throughout their concurrent coaching tenures.
Bunting went out in grand style, winning his final two games against the school’s biggest rivals, NC State, 23-9, and Duke, 45-44. Against the Pack, the Tar Heels forced three fourth-quarter turnovers to seal the victory.
State’s regular season ended with a loss to East Carolina—also its seventh defeat in a row—and Amato was terminated when the season ended.
Similar to Michaels, UNC assistant Everett Withers was elevated to interim coach in the summer before the 2011 season, after coach Butch Davis was fired in the aftermath of a longterm academic scandal in Chapel Hill.
Withers, too, was a candidate for the fulltime position. The Heels got off to a fast start in the season, winning five of its first six games, but then lost four of its final six games, including a 13-0 loss to feisty triple-play coach Tom O’Brien’s Wolfpack in Carter-Finley Stadium. It was the Pack’s first shutout of the Tar Heels since 1960, when it recorded a 3-0 victory in Chapel Hill.
In the week before the game, O’Brien emphasized the difference between the two schools, who claim co-flagship status within the UNC System, at that time in the rivalry.
“At our school, A-No. 1, all classes have a syllabus,” O’Brien said. “Our players go to school, are not given grades and they graduate. It’s a little tougher here. Our guys earn what they get.”
It prompted apologies from the chancellors of both schools. Withers was not retained as the Tar Heels permanent coach after losing in the Independence Bowl to Missouri. O’Brien lasted another season with the Pack, but was released after compiling a 7-6 record the following season.
Brown, who will coach in Saturday’s game after being told on Tuesday that he would not be retained for next season, owns a 7-8 record as UNC’s head coach against the Wolfpack and a 7-10 overall record against State as head coach of the Tar Heels, Texas and Appalachian State.
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