Will NC State football play at App State in 2028? It’s uncertain

When NC State added a non-conference home-and-home with Virginia for the next two seasons last spring, it led the Wolfpack to move its 2025 away trip to Appalachian State to the 2028 campaign. 

And while the Pack paid the Mountaineers $300,000 to move that game three years down the road in a new agreement signed in February, according to WRAL, there’s a chance that game in Boone might not actually ever happen. 

“We don’t want to play that game on the road,” NC State coach Dave Doeren told TheWolfpacker.com in a recent 1-on-1 interview. “The conference doesn’t want us to play G5 road games. That was out of the commissioner’s mouth. And, so, unfortunately a contract was signed when it shouldn’t have been. That’s just the way it is. … I don’t know if the game’s going to happen there or not going to happen.”

The original home-and-home contract with App State was signed in 2021 to have NC State visit the Mountaineers in 2025 before they made the return trip to Raleigh in 2026. But a directive from ACC Commissioner Jim Phillips to avoid playing lower-level schools on the road, as Doeren alluded to, has put the Wolfpack’s 184-mile trek west to Kidd Brewer Stadium on pause, for now. 

The reasoning behind not wanting to play a Group of Five school on the road comes from when North Carolina went to App State and won 63-61 in 2022, Doeren said. Despite leaving with the win and surviving a fourth quarter that featured 62 total points, the Tar Heels went from receiving nine coaches poll votes to just three. That didn’t sit right with the ACC and Doeren can see the thinking behind it.

“Where’s the value in the game as a program?” Doeren said. “I understand it helps them, but you’re not in the business to help the other school. You’re in the business to help your school. Any road win against another opponent shouldn’t hurt you in the rankings, and it did hurt them. 

“To me, I don’t understand. From an argument standpoint, how can you say it’s the wrong move to not play there if you have living proof that another team suffered winning there. It’s one thing to lose there, but to win there and go down in the rankings, that shouldn’t happen.”

NC State is currently scheduled to play at App State and East Carolina, both Group of Five programs, during the 2028 campaign. Will either game happen? Time will tell, but state lawmakers tried to make it an every year occurrence last year. In HB 965, which didn’t make it to the House floor, prominent Republicans wanted to make it mandatory for NC State and UNC to play App State, Charlotte or ECU every year in football and basketball.

Doeren, meanwhile, knows what it’s like to be in the other shoes of a Group of Five program with Power Conference neighbors. 

The Pack’s 13th-year coach spent two seasons as Northern Illinois’ head coach in 2011 and 2012, where he wasn’t able to get a home Power Conference game. Instead, Doeren’s teams played Iowa and Wisconsin at the Chicago Bears’ Solider Field with another true road game against the Badgers. 

“I have great respect for App and when I was the head coach at Northern Illinois, I was like them,” Doeren said. “No one wanted to play us, and you shouldn’t want to play on the road at a G5.”

If NC State elects to cancel the game at App State, it would be subject to a $2.5-million cancellation penalty, according to WRAL. If the Wolfpack decided to continue moving the game down the road, outside of seven years from the 2028 date, it would owe the Mountaineers another $450,000 in penalties. 

While Doeren and the Wolfpack are following what the ACC wants NC State to do, he is looking forward to the home-and-home series with Virginia. The two teams will play on Sept. 6 (the same date as the original App State game was scheduled for) at Carter-Finley Stadium before going to Charlottesville next fall.

“I think playing regional teams is great,” Doeren said of playing the Cavaliers in the non-conference. “It took forever to play Duke and UVA in the old system, where it was Coastal and Atlantic. 

“To me, it just makes sense. If you’re going to play a non-conference game but have to go to Texas Tech, we don’t recruit a lot of Texas kids. But we recruit a lot of Virginia kids. For us, it’s about maximizing opportunity when you play on the road. … There’s recruiting advantages to winning that game, if you can win it.”

NC State’s current 2025 non-conference schedule features home games against Campbell, East Carolina and Virginia with a road trip to Notre Dame.

In 2026, the Pack is currently slated to host App State and Richmond, while traveling to Vanderbilt and Virginia. NC State has home dates with North Carolina A&T, Kansas State and Louisiana Tech with a road game at Texas Tech in 2027. In addition to currently going to App State and ECU, NC State is booked to host Campbell and Vanderbilt in its 2028 non-conference slate.