What they’re saying after NC State’s win at UNC

NC State needed to find a way to beat North Carolina for the fourth straight season if it wanted to extend its bowl streak to five seasons on Saturday afternoon. The Wolfpack found itself in a back-and-fourth second half and the team clad in red and white found a way to edge the Tar Heels 35-30 inside Kenan Stadium. 

The Pack scored 28 points in the final two quarters, including the go-ahead touchdown from redshirt freshman Hollywood Smothers with 25 seconds left to secure the win.

Here is what those who covered the game are saying about the Pack’s victory over the Tar Heels. 

Ethan McDowell, The Wolfpacker — Column: NC State’s win over UNC still matters a lot, and that should give you hope

Dave Doeren began his postgame press conference with a big smile on his face. This wasn’t just another win. For the fourth year in a row and the second-consecutive matchup in Chapel Hill, NC State celebrated a victory over UNC. 

Even in a year where the Wolfpack deviated from its usual standard of success, coming into this game with 5 wins needing a victory to clinch bowl eligibility, the team won the game that matters the most. 

“I’ve got some good memories in this room,” the head coach said as he sat down for the postgame presser. 

The Wolfpack doesn’t downplay the importance of this matchup. Picking up a sixth win was great but, in Doeren’s eyes, that did not compare to picking up another win over the Tar Heels. From his first days in Raleigh more than a decade ago, a distaste for the Tar Heels was stressed incessantly. 

Noah Fleischman, The Wolfpacker — How NC State’s young playmakers powered Wolfpack over UNC

CHAPEL HILL — He could have hung his head after he dropped a crucial pass that could have set up a manageable field goal attempt in a 1-point loss at Georgia Tech a little over a week ago. He could have continued to sulk after two more balls went square off his hands to fall incomplete on back-to-back plays in his first taste of the NC State and North Carolina rivalry.

But instead of choosing to hide, redshirt freshman wide receiver Noah Rogers stayed focused. He knew his time was going to come in what turned out to be a second-half shootout against the Tar Heels. All Rogers was hoping for was another opportunity. 

The wideout had to wait nearly two quarters for that chance to arrive, but it turned out to be one of the biggest plays for the Pack. 

With just under a minute left in regulation, down by 1 to UNC, Rogers ran a go-route looking to create a chunk play for the Wolfpack. He streaked down the far side of the field, right down the middle of the numbers on the Tar Heels’ artificial turf playing surface. By the time he looked back to freshman quarterback CJ Bailey, the ball was halfway to him with two UNC defenders blanketing him. 

As the ball descended from its apex, Rogers was sandwiched between UNC defensive backs Marcus Allen and Will Hardy. But Bailey’s pass found its way through Hardy’s hands, directly into his wide receiver’s mitts and Rogers held on for dear life. He secured the catch, popped up and celebrated with an NC State fan on the sideline. 

Rogers’ 44-yard reception, his only catch of the evening, helped set up the go-ahead touchdown that redshirt freshman running back Hollywood Smothers scored with 25 seconds to play. That two-year plunge propelled NC State over UNC 35-30 on Saturday night at Kenan Stadium. 

Jadyn Watson-Fisher, News & Observer — ‘We fight as hard as we can’: NC State digs deep to pull off gritty win against Carolina

The front of N.C. State’s helmets feature three letters: HTT. 

Hard. Tough. Together. 

That has been the Wolfpack football program’s motto for years, and it showed up in a big way on Saturday night in Chapel Hill when N.C. State defeated North Carolina, 35-30, to win a fourth consecutive rivalry game and become bowl eligible.

“No matter what we go through, we fight as hard as we can and just continue battling to find a way to win,” graduate defensive end Davin Vann said. “I saw that really in our offense. We put them in a bad situation. That last two minutes, they just went down the field and just continued hammering away, making plays, doing what they needed to do.”

Luke DeCock, News & Observer — When .500 feels fantastic: N.C. State revels in 35-30 rivalry win over North Carolina

The playoff committee wasn’t locked into this one. The prize on offer was whatever bowl berth the ACC will have left lying around Sunday afternoon. Maybe somewhere like Birmingham, with the actual bonus another 10 practices with a bunch of players who — in college football in 2024 — probably won’t be around next season anyway. 

So why was N.C. State’s D.K. Kaufman so desperate to plant a Wolfpack flag in the middle of Kenan Stadium’s fake turf that it provoked a surge of returning North Carolina players who had been on their way off the field? And why was J.J. Jones moved to tear the flag away from him and ignite a brawl of sparring players pushing and shoving and grabbing at each other’s helmets?

Because it’s N.C. State and North Carolina, North Carolina and N.C. State. And even when the net result of the Wolfpack’s 35-30 win Saturday is the enforced mediocrity of .500 football for both 6-6 teams, this one win (or loss) matters more than the other five wins (or losses).

Andrew Carter, News & Observer — ‘I think it’s time to go’: How Mack Brown’s disappointing sendoff epitomized second UNC tenure

In a different, more just world, Mack Brown would’ve had the ideal and storybook sendoff on Saturday at Kenan Stadium. He would’ve left the field riding atop his players’ shoulders, victorious. The crowd would’ve been chanting his name. He and his wife, Sally, would’ve disappeared into the tunnel hand-in-hand, leaving in their trail a scene of jubilation after one more happy memory. 

Reality, though, has always had a pesky habit of interfering ever since Brown returned to North Carolina in late 2018. He arrived talking the big talk — of winning “now,” and of competing with Clemson for supremacy in the ACC. He wanted to lead the Tar Heels back to where they were toward the end of his first tenure, in the mid-1990s, and that was always the best-case scenario.

The most realistic case? Well, how everything actually played out was probably pretty close. 

There were some dizzying highs, especially early in Brown’s comeback, and some confounding lows. And it ended Saturday in a 35-30 defeat against N.C. State that, fair or not, somehow epitomized a lot of Mack 2.0 — the good, the bad and, especially, the disappointing, unfulfilling ending.

Colby Trotter, Technician — Can NC State football’s promising young offense be enough to regain the trust of the fanbase?

CHAPEL HILL — Last season after NC State football beat UNC-Chapel Hill 39-20 to end its regular season on a five-game winning streak and finish 9-4, head coach Dave Doeren made a plea to the Wolfpack fans.

“For all you folks that want us to keep winning, I would tell you to get on Savage Wolves, find that link,” Doeren said. “I’d love to see 5,000 people donate $1,000 to our NIL and get us to a point where we can recruit, retain and develop and have a program in the NIL world where the guys on our roster are able to benefit from that.”

Wolfpack fans answered the call.

NC State spent untold sums of money in the offseason from the donations it received to bring in talents like graduate quarterback Grayson McCall, redshirt freshman receiver Noah Rogers and redshirt freshman running back Hollywood Smothers, just to name a few.

It was considered to be one of the best transfer classes in the country that could push NC State from good to great. From eight wins to 10-plus. From a third or fourth-place finish in the ACC to a spot in the championship game.

Instead of securing that coveted 10-win season at Chapel Hill, the Wolfpack entered the game against its bitter rival needing a win to secure bowl eligibility. That was a failure in itself considering the preseason expectations. A lot of blame was put on Doeren for how he built his roster around transfers.

Aaron Beard, Associated Press — Smothers’ late TD helps NC State edge rival North Carolina 35-30 in Brown’s farewell at UNC

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. (AP) — Hollywood Smothers slipped through the middle of the line for a 2-yard touchdown with 25 seconds left to help N.C. State beat rival North Carolina 35-30 on Saturday night in the Tar Heels’ final game under Mack Brown.

Smothers’ short TD run capped the go-ahead 75-yard drive that pushed the Wolfpack (6-6, 3-5 Atlantic Coast Conference) to bowl eligibility. The key play was CJ Bailey’s deep ball to Noah Rogers, who snagged a 44-yard catch while taking contact from two defenders to set up the go-ahead score.

That capped a wild finish that saw the Tar Heels (6-6, 3-5) take a 30-29 lead on Omarion Hampton’s 47-yard catch and run to the end zone with 1:51 left in a huge day for UNC’s top weapon.

“These kids just get up and fight — these grown men get up and fight, and I’m proud of them,” Wolfpack coach Dave Doeren said. “Every time they made a play on their sideline, we responded with a play on our sideline.”