NC State football countdown to 2023 kickoff: 89
The NC State football season opener for 2023 is at Connecticut on Aug. 31 — or 89 days away. TheWolfpacker.com’s countdown for the season looks at the significance of the number 89 in Pack history.
NC State Football And No. 89
• History was made for NC State football during the 1989 season with one of the greatest individual throwing performances at “Quarterback U.” Former Wolfpack quarterback Shane Montgomery set a school record by passing for 535 yards during a 35-26 loss at Duke.
Over three decades later, that remains the most passing yards in a single game for NC State football. Montgomery attempted 73 passes (had 37 completions) in that contest, which also remains a school record. He also was credited for three runs, which netted a pair of yards to give Montgomery a school-record 537 total yards.
That game remains the lone performance of 500 passing yards or more in a single game for the Pack. Montgomery finished the year with 2,632 yards passing, the highest in a season at NC State football at the time. Jamie Barnette eclipsed the mark nine years later.
Montgomery has gone on to carve out a career as a college assistant coach, working as an offensive coordinator at several stops. He is currently a senior offensive analyst at East Carolina.
• During that same game in 1989, the duo of Reggie Lawrence and Al Byrd became the first NC State players to each have 100 yards receiving in the same contest. Lawrence made five catches for 129 yards, and Byrd added five receptions for 126 yards.
They were two of four different NC State players to have 100-yard receiving games during that ’89 season.
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• NC State football concluded the ’89 season playing in the Copper Bowl in Tucson, Ariz., losing an unofficial road contest to Arizona, 17-10. Since the San Diego Credit Union Holiday Bowl was canceled in the last minute by UCLA this past December, that Copper Bowl remains the furthest west that NC State has ever traveled for a postseason game.
That also remains the only time NC State and Arizona has ever met in a football game.
• Know which former NC State football coach holds the school record for highest winning percentage? Mickey Whitehurst.
Whitehurst only coached two seasons, 1907 and 1908. In those two years, Whitehurst went 12-1-1, an 89.3 percent winning percentage.
His 1907 team was the only in school history to win at least six games and go unbeaten. NC State finished the year 6-0-1.
