Extra Points: Highlight Reel

By Lee Pace

Down Amber Alley from Franklin Street, just across the old brick sidewalk from the entrance to the Rathskellar, was a tiny print shop whose name escapes me in the haze of advancing age. It was there at 8 a.m. every Monday morning during the 1990 football season I'd deliver a 3.5-inch floppy disk with a file created in Aldus PageMaker chronicling that weekend's Tar Heel football game.

Along with that I'd leave a stack of labels, and the shop's proprietor after printing the four-page publication I'd created on Sunday would adhere by manual labor the names and addresses and then deliver them to the post office. With any luck, by Wednesday you'd have in your mailbox the latest issue of Extra Points—guaranteed to provide some insight you'd not find from the daily papers or the very few specialty publications (and basketball-oriented ones at that) of the day.

How very quaint.

Times evolve over nearly three decades—new technology, new media, new distribution methods, from ink on paper to 140 characters in cyberspace. But the essence of college football season remains the same, and I'm back for year 28 cobbling together a missive under the Extra Points banner.

With the exception of missing the Tar Heels' trip to Clemson that first year because of a long-planned family occasion (and how convenient, given the outcome was hardly ever in doubt since it was still the Danny Ford heyday for the Tigers and Mack Brown was coming off his 2-20 Carolina christening), I've seen 308 straight Tar Heel football games, home and away—from Salt Lake City to El Paso, from Miami to Madison. Given the retirements of broadcaster Woody Durham and doctor Tim Taft, given the heart attack that sidelined for one game in 2010 Walter Davis, who's managed the coaches' headphones since the early 1980s, I believe I'm the incumbent with the longest such string—unless and until proven otherwise. (Cue the wisecracks: Glutton for punishment, huh?)

What keeps me coming back? Why am I just as anxious for 12:20 this Saturday as I was for 1 p.m. on Sept. 1, 1990, when Miami (Ohio) visited Kenan Stadium?

Well, let's begin with the venue. There's nothing like Kenan Stadium in college football, two symmetrical sets of concrete viewing stands tucked into a natural valley that in 1927 was the southern outpost of the campus. Botany professor William Coker designed the landscape around it and footpaths were carved through the trees for access and egress. The forest has grown up and some trees have come down over nearly a century, but the grand old dame remains nestled in the bosom of an idyllic campus. It's just so spot-on I might have to write a book. Oh, wait …

Big plays at home. Being in the thick of 50,000 to 60,000 Tar Heels who are exploding over a play that ignites a rout or wins a game is exhibit A in the appeal category. The floodgates officially opened in the Heels' historic rout of big, bad Florida State in 2001 when Ronald Curry hit Kory Bailey for a 53-yard score to open the fourth quarter. Freshman Khalif Mitchell popped the ball loose at the goal line, forcing T.A. McClendon's fumble in 2004, and three weeks later another freshman with ice in his veins, Connor Barth, popped a 41-yard field goal to beat fourth-ranked Miami. And of course—where were you when Gio Bernard scampered 74 yards with a punt return to detonate the Wolfpack in 2012?

Upsets on the road. As sweet as it is to revel with the home folks, in some respects venturing into foreign land with ill-mannered hosts and battening their traps shut is equally as fun. Technically, the Carolina vs. USC game in 1993 was played at a neutral site in Anaheim, but in reality it was a road game, and the Tar Heels pummeled the high-and-mighty Trojans by three touchdowns. Butch Davis engineered wins over ranked teams in back-to-back years, stunning Virginia Tech in Blacksburg on a Thursday night ESPN game in 2009 and Florida State the following year. There was the three-touchdown rally to nudge Georgia Tech in 2015, and later that year, everyone from the Pope to the President was pulling for kindly old Frank Beamer to win his last game as the Hokies' coach. Wrong, said Quinshad Davis in the corner of the end zone.

Underdogs. As egos and the attendant publicity machine have grown in recruiting in recent years, it's heartening and refreshing to see kids come from the woodwork as walk-ons, win scholarships and carve a productive niche. Cornerback Thomas Smith and linebacker David Thornton came from the wilds of eastern North Carolina with zero stars and later suited up in the NFL. Of recent vintage, Mack Hollins was picked on as a DB his first practice in 2012 and now is on the Philadelphia Eagles' roster as a receiver and special teams demon. And this very moment, receiver Thomas Jackson and linebacker Cole Holcomb will play important roles as the 2017 season unfolds.

Personalities. The class clowns in 1990 were Deems May and Joey Jauch, who claim to have batted 1.000 hosting high school recruits on Fridays and getting them to commit to the Tar Heels soon after. Since then there's been fullback Madison Hedgecock steamrolling would-be tacklers while dreaming of chopping wood. The seeds of a country music career were planted for Chase Rice in the glories and tragedies of college football. Jesse Holley stopped talking long enough to catch 126 passes before finding reality TV and making the Dallas Cowboys roster. There was A.J. Blue's steely resolve, Eric Ebron's million-watt smile, Marquise Williams' inherent good nature, T.J. Yates' grace in handling the ups and downs of the quarterback job over four years. And certainly there've been any number of jolly good fellows along the offensive line.

Tricks. One epic slight-of-hand story was slightly ahead of my time, but I've heard so much about Paul Miller's bootleg against Duke in 1970 I feel like I was there. And though it was not standard trick-a-ration per se, Dick Crum handing off to Amos Lawrence on draw plays in long-yardage situations against Duke in 1978, my senior year at Carolina, qualifies. Maybe the best gadget of the Mack Brown era was setting Maryland up with sweep after sweep by Natrone Means in College Park in 1992, then having Means flip the ball to flanker Randall Felton coming the opposite direction for the winning score. Of more recent vintage have been Willie Parker scoring on "Rooskie" at Pitt in 2000, fullback Bobby Rome's passes (he was a record-setting quarterback in high school), receiver Quinshad Davis going 4-for-4 with four TDs passing from 2013-15, and Ryan Switzer's flea-flicker for a TD to open the Duke game in 2015.

The vantage point. Since first joining the Rams Club in 1987, I've had season tickets in most every nook of Kenan Stadium, settling for the last dozen or so years in Section 118, top row of the southwest corner. Of course I'm never there, watching as I have since 2004 from the sideline as part of the Tar Heel Sports Network team. Honestly, it's a bad seat. There's a reason so many important coaching decisions are made from up high, where you get the total perspective. But it is fun to be smack in that cauldron of noise and emotion as the second half evolves of a critical ACC game in October and to see Bug Howard five steps away reel in a game-winning catch to beat Pitt.

Domination. Man, it's awesome when the Heels are really, really good at something. Carolina's defense from 1996-97 and offense the last five years (2012 and '15 in particular) have been sights to behold. Those defenses with Greg Ellis upfront and Dré Bly in the back were staggering—10 points a game allowed in '96 and 13 the following year. And who could have dreamed during the "three-yards-and-a-cloud-of-dust" Bill Dooley regime of the 1970s that the Tar Heels would one day average 454 yards a game as they have for five years in the "Fed Spread." Now, if Tar Heel football could just put both sides of the ball together in the same season, we'd be on to something. Which is why I'm back yet again.

Chapel Hill writer Lee Pace (UNC '79) is the author of "Football in a Forest—The Life and Times of Kenan Memorial Stadium." Let him know if you've seen more than 308 Carolina games in person in a row at leepace7@gmail.com or @LeePaceTweet.

Players Mentioned

Cole Holcomb

Mack Hollins

Bug Howard

Thomas Jackson

Ryan Switzer

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