The football team defeated UNC-Chapel Hill this weekend by a final score of 28-27 in a picture-perfect ending for Tom O’Brien and his seniors. And with that, the shattered dreams of Wolfpack Nation reassembled themselves and the season will go in the record books as a successful one.
The meltdown against Wake Forest? Not important. The bomb at Blacksburg? Distant history. The Pack’s 5-7 overall record will take a back seat because State knocked those pesky Tar Heels down a peg on their way to the postseason.
But as I was walking to my car after the game, I heard a few drunken students chanting at a pair of Carolina alums decked out in baby blue. They asked amid peals of laughter if the ladies enjoyed the game.
“At least we’re going bowling,” one of the girls hissed back.
Can’t argue with that logic.
I don’t mean to dampen anyone’s spirits here – beating Carolina was a great accomplishment, to be sure – but let’s take a look at what is really important to the Athletic Department and the school as a whole.
The only time anyone in Raleigh pretended to care about Wolfpack men’s soccer this past year was when they defeated UNC in the opening round of the ACC tournament in penalty kicks. And last Wednesday, the Pack volleyball team, which hadn’t won an ACC match all year and only two games against Maryland back in October, rallied to defeat the Tar Heels at home in a game they were never supposed to stand a chance in. Suddenly, the total waste of a season had a bright spot. The volleyball team was no longer the laughingstock of the ACC – it was “the team that beat Carolina.” That is, to be sure, the more important of the two distinctions, as Lee Fowler would like you to believe.
The football team has now beaten Carolina three years in a row with O’Brien at the helm, with the Tar Heels ranked two of those times. But one has to ask which is really important – beating a storied rival or earning hardware? Which do you think is better for recruiting, beating UNC or making it to a bowl game?
Neither game mattered. Both teams’ seasons were far beyond consequence. Pack fans were able to hold onto that one positive after seasons full of failure, but that shouldn’t be enough. Beating Carolina didn’t save the season; it just added an exclamation point to the end of it.
State fans and students need to demand postseason results instead of taking solace in modest victories in a rivalry State hasn’t really been a major player in for years. Ask almost any Carolina or Duke fan and they will tell you that while any game against N.C. State is a major one, it isn’t one they’ll ask off work for.
The students and alumni of N.C. State donate far too much of their hard-earned money toward N.C. State’s athletic mediocrity for one day of victorious, fleeting bliss. Suffering through this football and volleyball season for one weekend may be enough for some, but it’s important to remember that we’re supposed to have that bliss all year long.
Beating Carolina was incredible. But let me know if that keeps you warm this December while the Heels are attempting to add to their trophy case.
