Extra Points: Natrone Bomb

By the first week of October 1990, it was apparent that Mack Brown as a coach and Natrone Means as tailback had some potential.

Brown, 39, had been throttled in his first two years as Carolina's head coach with a 2-20 record, but his ability in recruiting, discipline and establishing a healthy culture beyond Saturday afternoons was apparent, buying him time with university administration.

Means, 18, stood 5-foot-10, 230 pounds and was a freshman feeling his way through the myriad of university life and Division 1 football. He brought an immense array of skills from his home in Harrisburg, most notably a remarkable blend of speed (he was clocked at 4.5 in the 40-yard dash in high school) and power (he'd been flagged in Pop Warner football for unnecessary roughness while carrying the football). But managing school work, practice, conditioning, nutrition and the attention to all the details requisite to success wasn't quite the cakewalk he'd anticipated coming as a big man on campus from Central Cabarrus High in Concord.

There was no "line in the sand" measurement that Carolina Athletic Director John Swofford was looking for as the 1990 season beckoned, but without question being competitive and winning some games was essential for Brown and the Tar Heels. They had not beaten ACC kingpin Clemson in five years, rolling back to the era of former coach Dick Crum. Wake Forest and former Tar Heel coach Bill Dooley had whipped Carolina three years in a row. Duke had won three straight, N.C. State two in a row.

At the time before television proliferation and conference expansion, teams generally played their non-conference games early in the year, and the Tar Heels showed some promise in beating Miami (Ohio), Connecticut and Kentucky. But they lost by 22 on the road against a middling South Carolina team in the second game. Their first ACC game came against N.C. State in Kenan Stadium in late September, the Wolfpack claiming a 12-9 win on a last minute, line-drive field goal from 56 yards out.

Means had made his presence known in his first two months in Chapel Hill. On the first day the team donned pads in August, he stormed past sophomore linebacker Tommy Thigpen in a one-on-one drill, leaving Thigpen to endure the catcalls from his teammates that he'd been bested by a freshman. Means got spot duty in four games in September, carrying the ball 32 times for 146 yards.

"Natrone was on our radar immediately," says Dwight Hollier, a junior linebacker that season. "He was a different back. He was immediately making plays, running around people or through them, whatever he needed to do."

But he sat and watched the entire game at South Carolina, the result of running backs coach Darrell Moody's ire at Means' carelessness in leaving a handout of play diagrams and game plan notes somewhere around the team hotel on Friday night.

"In our meeting before the game, Coach Moody asked us to turn in our game plans," Means remembers. "He knew I didn't have mine. Someone found it and turned it in to him. He ripped me pretty good. I didn't play a snap that game. I watched from the bench. I figured out pretty quick that watching sucks. But it was part of the learning process."

Means grew up a Tar Heel fan and remembers looking up to tailbacks of the 1980s as his idols—Ethan Horton, Tyrone Anthony and William Humes, among them. Horton was of particular interest since he was from nearby A.L. Brown High in Kannapolis and was mentioned regularly in the local newspaper. Young Natrone was a regular watcher of The Dick Crum Show every Sunday, and on Saturday night sleepovers with his grandmother would surreptitiously forget to bring his church shoes so he'd be left at the house and free to watch Tar Heel highlights. He says he was probably "the easiest commit coach Brown ever had. He sat me down on my visit and said they were going to offer me. I said, 'I'm ready.'"

And after a woeful offensive performance against the Wolfpack, the Tar Heel coaches were ready as well. Carolina's offense gained a meager 174 yards, and the running game generated only 98 yards on 44 rushing plays. Brown and Moody were forced to shake things up.

"I came in on Sunday in the offensive staff meeting and said we had to make a change," Moody says. "Our backs played hard and they competed in that State game, but they didn't get one inch that wasn't blocked. You can't win that way. Our backs had to get more on their own than we were getting."

"We didn't have an identity on offense," Brown adds. "We needed to find an answer. The Wake Forest game was huge for us. Coach Dooley had a lot of credibility for what he'd done here and at Virginia Tech. By that point in the season, it was Natrone's turn."

Means remembers Moody in the running backs meeting at the start of the week saying that whoever had the best week in practice would get the starting nod in Winston-Salem.

"That's all I needed to hear," Means says. "That was my chance."

Means lined up in the I-formation behind fullback Mike Faulkerson and quarterback Todd Burnett to start the game in Groves Stadium, but the first half was hardly to the Tar Heels' liking. In a span of six minutes in the second quarter, they lost four fumbles (two by punt returners, one by the fullback and another by Means) and were down 24-10 late in the first half. Means scored on a two-yard run just before halftime to give the Tar Heels a lift, then late in the third quarter came one of the biggest plays of the season.

From the Carolina 28 yard-line, Means went in motion to the left and Burnett rolled right. He read the coverage on that side, then planted and threw back across the field to Means, who'd run a wheel route and was open at midfield. Means snared the pass, started downfield, stuttered to let two Deacon defenders collide into one another and then raced downfield for the score. Means totaled 138 yards on 24 carries with two touchdowns as the Tar Heels exorcised their ACC and Big Four losing demons with a 31-24 triumph.

"It was kind of his coming out party and also made a statement that we were legitimate again," Brown says. "It was a turning of the tide for the program."

Means says of those first two months: "It was by no means a smooth process. I was in my own way a little bit, getting used to being away from home, being on my own, having to understand and realize what it takes to be part of a college football program. There were growing pains, a learning curve. I got some cleanup minutes the first four games. But I was ready to go. All you want is to get out there and show what you can do. The Wake Forest game was awesome for me. Once I got that job, I was intent to not let it go."

After the spark from Winston-Salem, the Tar Heels tied eventual national champion Georgia Tech and beat Maryland to finish 6-4-1 and establish an upsloping trendline through the climax of an 11-1 season and No. 4 national ranking in 1997, the last year of Mack 1.0. The stage was set for Means to shine as well. He started every game the rest of the year, climaxing the season with a 256-yard, three-touchdown pulverizing of Duke. He was the featured back the next two years as well, carrying the ball on sweeps and powers, on option pitches and snagging passes out of the backfield. After rushing for 3,074 yards in three seasons, he was ready for the NFL after the 1992 season.

"People couldn't fathom how fast he was for his size," Moody says. "He was a lot faster than people wanted to give him credit for. Not many people caught him from behind. He had great eyes and great balance. He had things you can't coach."

"He was really freakish," Brown adds. "He was big and strong and had those big thighs and could really run over you, but you were so worried about getting run over, he'd give you a little juke and go around you."

Kevin Donnalley was the Tar Heels' starting left tackle in 1990 and remembers the mental boost the blocking front got knowing the gifts that Means brought to the lineup.

"Believe me, as former offensive lineman, this is a guy I knew wasn't taking any tackles for a loss," he says. "We had second-and-six a lot with him, you knew he'd get you positive yards on first down. And then he'd pop a big one. We were building the program at the time and had to scratch, fight and claw for everything we got. Natrone was the perfect answer for what we needed."

Means played seven years in the NFL, most notably his first three with the San Diego Chargers. He gained 1,350 yards his second season in 1994, helped the Chargers to the Super Bowl and made All-Pro. His touchdown against the 49ers in a loss in Super Bowl XXIX gave him the distinction of becoming at 22 years of age the youngest player to score in the Super Bowl (a 21-year-old Jamal Lewis of the Ravens nudged him out seven years later). One San Diego newspaper pegged him a "245-pound clap of thunder with a lightning bolt on his uniform."

Natrone and Asha Means — Asha and Natrone Means

Means retired from football in 2000 and set about becoming a family man, him and his wife Shonda raising four children. He missed the camaraderie, challenge and competition of football, though, and entered the coaching profession in 2005 and over the next decade and a half would work his way at various posts in high school and college. Most recently, he spent six years at Winston-Salem State and one at Fayetteville State in various roles, including offensive coordinator and associate head coach. Then Brown offered him a position as an offensive analyst in the spring of 2021 and Means thought the exposure to the operation of a Power 5 program would be a good career move. The timing was perfect as well because his youngest daughter, Asha, would enter Chapel Hill in August 2021 as a forward on the Tar Heel women's soccer team.

He does much of what his title suggests—he analyzes the Tar Heels, their opponents and potential recruits, helps prepare practice scripts and assists running backs coach Larry Porter and offensive coordinator Phil Longo with whatever needs to be done, short of actually hands-on coaching of players.

"I've enjoyed my time here so far," he says. "In my last role, I was worried about everything on the offense. Now, I have specific tasks. But getting the chance to be a part of this program bodes well for the future."

And Brown likes having Means around for the example he sets—the quality of individual and player he was and how he's representative of the lifelong commitment Tar Heels tend to make to the program. It's 40 years, not four years, as Brown likes to say. It doesn't hurt to have someone of Means' currency address the Tar Heels the night before the Duke game and tell them that "back in the day" losing to Duke was simply not an option (their 1990 win ignited a 13-year victory streak).

"Natrone's really smart, he's got great common sense, he's a good person and has a good family," Brown says. "He's a great influence on everyone here. We showed his highlight tape when he was hired, plays from both here and the NFL, so our guys could understand where he'd been."

It's been 31 years since those Tar Heels were underdogs to Wake Forest and needed a win in the worst way. Natrone Means delivered, and Mack Brown's never forgotten.

"I would not be in the Hall of Fame or still coaching if not for that night," Brown says.

That's a bit of an exaggeration, certainly. But many dominoes started falling that night when No. 20 ran wild over the field in Groves Stadium.

Chapel Hill writer Lee Pace began writing "Extra Points" during that 1990 season and has been chronicling Tar Heel football ever since. Write him at leepace7@gmail.com and follow him at @LeePaceTweet.

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