It ain’t Chuckie’s Wolfpack any more. The TO’B Era of Wolfpack Football was formally christened on a brisk November afternoon in Carter-Finley. Just another last-second nailbiter in the Battle For Backyard Braggin’ Rights. And Rob Petrie trips over that ottoman AGAIN!
Surely you remember The Dick Van Dyke Show …. Mary Tyler Moore in those toreador pants and EVERY time “Rob” (DVD) walks in the living room, he trips over that same ottoman. UNC has its own “Rob trips” EVERY TIME. ….. ooooh robbbbb!
Every time UNC loses in anything, but especially Football or Basketball, wait about 3-4 seconds after the clock hits 00:00 and hear the inevitable UNC fan whine “the lousy biased-agin-us refs stole the game from us”. Not sometime. Not occasionally, Not most of the time but EVERY SINGLE TIME. Like Rob Petrie and the ottoman. Kerplunk.
When our fans even did it after the Utah and Louisville massacres it set an NCAA standard for patheticness. There should be a banner in the rafters to commemorate it.
Three of the past four State v Carolina games have come down to the eventual losing team having the ball in the last minute with a chance to tie or win the game. THAT is “my money’s worth” football entertainment FOR SURE.
After the ECU game in early September I noted to #23 From Garden City that his rushing records seemed safe for at least another season. Hell, Willie Parker’s UNC rushing stats are safe for another year.
The #106th rushing defense in America stiffened up considerably on Saturday afternoon. Twelve yards rushing!!! Three Quarterback sneaks and “take a knee” can get more than that! The ACC could have picked the refs from the drunkest bums in F-Bomb Alley and UNC can’t win with TWELVE RUSHING YARDS! Imagine if we were playing the 97th rushing defense in America!
At the end of the first quarter I was uh oh-ing and wondering when TO’B would call off the rampaging Pack and put in his 3rd Team running back ….. til I realized that is who gained 159 yards Saturday. I was quite proud of the Tar Heels for fighting back after that first quarter Wuff-onslaught.
On State’s winning TD drive, 58,000 were all thinking “TA ja vou” as the drive seemed to stall on the one with time running out. Jamelle ain’t TA.
The only number smaller than UNC’s rushing yardage was the # of penalties called on NCSU – 2. Chuck’s swaggering thugs used to be good for at least 3 in pre-game warm-ups.
It’s not my place to do so ….. but I’m thinking State fans can cease and desist any further mention of The Chuckie Era. File those bad dreams, broken lupine hearts and red shoes away with Tom Reed, Monte Kiffin’s horse and Al Michaels. O’Brien’s Red-clad Marines scaled Mt Surabachi on Saturday and planted the TO’B flag. It’s Tom O’Brien’s Wolfpack now.
Yeah yeah yeah BobLee, but what about F-Bomb Alley. I did make a quick visit to “The Alley” early, about 9:45. The Mizzus and I had nine (9) WuffFan tailgate invites to make (three less than that rushing yardage total!). Given the choice of dumpster diving with human vermin or swapping hearty handshakes with hail-fellows-well-met, we opted for the latter. It did appear that uniformed security was beefed up. I’m going to give Wuff Admins the benefit of the doubt that they didn’t screw it up, in other words they overruled Tom Stafford’s Plan and used common sense.
For sure some sore loser Tar Heel fan will be hoping up and down claiming he personally saw 87 State hoodlums gang rape a mini-van load of UNC nuns at the funnel cake stand in the South grandstand …. But he didn’t really. Exaggerated reports of disgusting behavior by “their fans” is another nice urban legend tradition of these annual encounters.
As we exited C-F, I looked up at Vaughan Towers and wondered if we’d a won if State didn’t have “skyboxes” and both end zones enclosed. $150,000,000 of somebody else’s money from now, we’ll have ours and then we’ll show’em by golly.
All of our tailgate hosts were as nice as they could be (and this was BEFORE “those refs” cost us the game). Brett from Kinston, swear to Gawd, actually knows Harold “Buddo” Deters …. A neighborhood pal of mine from Little BobLee Days who was the last State placekicker to kick a FG in old Riddick Stadium in the mid 60s. How long ago was that ? “Buddo” used a square-toed shoe like Lou Groza. ….
Our on-campus Kenan (even without $150,000,000 in “keep Butch and the semi-literate 18 y/os happy” expansion) is a very fine arboreal facility smack in the middle of a lovely college campus blah blah blah ….. but for convenient GameDay tailgating Carter-Finley (minus The Alley of course) is about as ideal as one could design. It WORKS!
We walked the whole area and noted how many pre-game parties had blue and red fans breaking bread together. YES !!!! It warmed the cockles of this Internet Legend’s heart to be reminded that real people in real life still are in control ….. may it always be so.
I can report not a single display of untoward behavior from the Home fans. Obviously the student section seating situation “needs work” as their upper level section fills like a Nova Scotia tidal bore thirty seconds before kick-off ….. another Stafford whizbang plan no doubt.
I generally avoid “student sections” at any stadium I visit (like I avoid rest rooms at bus stations). For the same reason I don’t drink milk left on the back porch for three days …. Or stick my hand down a rattlesnake hole. I’m smart enough to know all these experiences will leave a bad taste in my mouth. Jackass students is jackass students …. Most will grow out of their jackassiness. Others will get a lifetime pass to “the Alley”.
The TO’B Era has arrived at NCSU and has officially left BC. Coach Jag (and Logan) have detoured down the same boulevard of broken BCS dreams that South Florida cruised earlier. …. And since UNC fans expressed their admiration for Good Neighbor Grobe, his Deacons have crashed and burned twice. Sorry we jinxed you Jim. …… Charlie The Hutt’s Not Fighting Very Hard Irish lose to yet another military academy. Thank goodness they don’t play Hargraves this year, opting instead for Ted Roof’s “one and done” Devils. Notre Dame vs Duke ….. Wallace Wade and Knute will be spinning in their graves as Win #2 is at stake for both institutions. …. And The Horseshoe has fallen out of the Buckeyes butt. The Zooker’s Illini juiced the #1 Ohioans leaving the BCS to the SEC and Big 12 to fight over.
OK …. How many of youans are desperately searching for a Butch & Jimmy Update? Butch & Jimmy Shear Sheep “went Platinum” within two hours of its posting on Friday morning. Oprah was recommending it and even those infamous “billion Chinese” who “don’t ever give a damn” had it translated into Mandarin by noon.
Internet servers were burning. The ticking e-mails wrapped in C-4 with anthrax frosting started arriving around 3 PM. I saved the one that said I was “more dangerous to UNC FB than that damn Dickie Baddour”. I sent a copy to Dickie. He laughed too.
It was all 100% true boys and girls. Several of my hypotheses have already proved accurate since I penned the infamous epic. Ruthless Jimma Sexton is INDEED changing the rules and demanding $$$$ increases he can collect 3% of. But who cares ….. it’s not any of our $$$$ …. right?
I fully expect that Butch Davis WILL STAY but it will cost UNC’s incredibly generous Really Big Rams another double fist-full of bearer bonds.
EVERY day in the cyber sewers. the board monkeys trash these very same incredibly generous families because “they are NOT real fans”. I’m calling out Buck Sanders from InsideCarolina and the CarolinaBlue guys to take note that this small group of VERY loyal Tar Heels who are personally “buying” Carolina a big time football program are verbally spat upon every day on their message boards. I’m all for Freedom of Speech but you would think rebuttals to these constant insulting attacks would be called for. What say you Buck?
Congrats to all my Wuff buddies. TO’B has quickly built you a very competitive program. Quicker than anyone thought …. and without the three best athletes on the pre-season roster. I only hope UNC’s quite sizable investment in The Pale Rider will prove equally as sound. It should ……
….. oops, who put that ottoman there?
The Kenan bazillions came primarily from railroads and Florida hotels via Mr Kenan’s marriage to Miss Flagler. Prior to that lucrative nuptial, Mr Kenan “discovered” calcium carbide. I bet, like me, you always wondered who discovered carbide.
The Chamber of Commerce hucksters in Charlotte are giddy. Time for a new slogan ….. “Charlotte – Home to NASCAR, bunches of big banks and $4,000/night hookers”. That’s enough to get George Shinn to move back to town!
