Tom O’Brien entered his tenure as head football coach with the knowledge that beating Carolina is among the top priorities for N.C. State fans. He quickly learned that beating Carolina doesn’t just mean beating UNC.
If the fact that his predecessor, Chuck Amato, was fired one day after losing to East Carolina in Carter-Finely Stadium wasn’t enough, the feedback from fans and players confirmed for O’Brien that the intense rivalry between the Wolfpack and the Pirates is very much alive.
“I said when I got here, it doesn’t matter if it says East, North or South on it, if Carolina is attached to it, it’s a big game for N.C. State,” O’Brien said at ACC Media day in July. “It’s not brain surgery.”
Though O’Brien hasn’t talked much to his team this week about the game as a rivalry, senior safety J.C. Neal said the implications are understood.
“It’s in state: everybody wants to win the so-called state championship,” Neal said.
For players like redshirt junior offensive tackle Julian Williams, the game against ECU is not only “a huge game for the program,” but the rivalry is intensified by the fact that players from either side have grown familiar with one another. As a result, bragging rights will be on the line Saturday.
“A lot of my guys from my high school that I played with play at East Carolina, maybe six or seven guys, and a lot more from my area,” Williams, a New Bern native, said. “It’s real big and I just want to see us play a physical game and dominate.”
The same rivalry among players who grew up together also exists among students. According to Kristin Honeycutt, an ECU freshman in exercise physiology, Saturday’s game could allow her to “pick on” her friends at N.C. State if the Pirates prevail, as predicted. Honeycutt said T-shirts on ECU’s campus are circulating for Saturday’s game, including one saying, “There’s blood in the water,” and one reading, “Wait ’til Carter-Finley.”
For State fans, the rivalry does not evoke the same hatred that State fans hold for UNC. Still, the fact that ECU has presented a challenge in recent years has renewed the rivalry between the teams. Such will be the case as No. 15 ECU enters the game as 7.5 point favorites.
“They look at it as a much bigger rivalry than we do,” said Justin Oakley, a senior in agricultural business management. “But it’s a growing rivalry because their athletics have picked up.”
Another factor leading to the intensified animosity towards the Pirates is the lack of class from some ECU fans in the past years, Oakley said.
In 1987, N.C. State officials suspended the series between the two teams after East Carolina fans tore down the goal posts in Carter-Finley after an ECU win. The two teams did not play again until 1992, when the teams met in the Peach Bowl.
“It’s easy to dislike them,” Oakley said.
