North Carolina's looking finer

Sporting News, The, Feb 17, 1997 by Michael Bradley

It would seem that nobody at Atlantic Coast Conference headquarters contacted the league's football coaches before deciding to admit Florida State in 1992. While ACC execs crowed about how adding the Seminoles was the proverbial "win win" situation--the conference traded its basketball reputation for much-needed football cache--there was no talk of the collateral damage.

All of a sudden, the league's football standard had been raised well out of the other schools' reach. Instead of competing against each other along the fringe of the college football elite, ACC teams would now be chasing all those bowl victories, 10-win seasons and top-four poll finishes associated with FSU. Second place began to look pretty good.

"The team that is winning the ACC is up there on the national scene, too." North Carolina coach Mack Brown says about Florida State. "If you're playing for the conference championship in the Atlantic Coast Conference, that will put you in the national picture."

Watching Bobby Bowden's fleet brutes rampage through conference play the past five seasons with just one loss has given Brown and his coaching rivals a serious case of Seminole envy. Since FSU's outrageous depth and overall athletic ability trump effort and game plans, there is but one way to catch up--recruit and sign the same caliber players. If the `Noles flood the field with five receiving gazelles, counter with a defensive backfield of cheetahs. When the defensive ends charge upfield ,like rhinos, beat them back with 300-pound tackles who run 4.8 40s.

It sounds easy, but it has been nearly impossible for ACC teams--until now. Thanks to what many consider its best recruiting class ever, Carolina has taken the boldest strongest step yet toward challenging Semi-nole primacy in the ACC. A month removed from a 10-win season that included a 13-0 near-miss in Tallahassee, the Tar Heels loaded up on a geographically diverse package of speed and power that will allow them to mount a serious long-term challenge to Florida State.

When the teams meet November 8 in Chapel Hill, the Seminoles may think they're looking in a Carolina Blue mirror. UNC might not match FSU's depth, but it will compare favorably--and at spots such as cornerback, superiorly--in most categories. Not only do newcomers Ravon Anderson, Domonique Williams and Rufus Brown (all tailbacks), Billy-Dee Greenwood (cornerback) and Merceda Perry (linebacker) have extraordinary skills, they also sound like Seminoles.

"Speed is a key for us," Brown says about the 18-member class. "You can make up for a lot of mistakes with speed. But we talk about production more than anything else."

Just as the Tar Heels are looking forward to their next generation of producers, so are several other schools giddy about the future, thanks to what are considered surprising recruiting hauls. The biggest shocker comes courtesy of Northwestern, which used its back-to-back Big Ten titles and coach Gary Barnett's decision to stay in Evanston to land its first top 20 recruiting class.

Alabama, which staggered on the trails last year in the wake of its NCAA probation, landed an abundant crop--most of it in-state--despite lingering scholarship limitations. And give kudos to Minnesota coach Glen Mason, whose solid class of 21 was assembled in less than six weeks after his arrival from Kansas and included eight players from the Land of 10,000 Lakes, the most since 1990.

Brown did not just wake up one morning with the epiphany that the Heels needed better talent to challenge FSU. Even ACC doormat Wake Forest knows that. No, the recruiting success came courtesy of several factors. The first was the Tar Heels' recent success. UNC has gone 57-25-1 during the 1990s, one of the 15 best winning percentages in the country during that period.

"This is a powerhouse on the rise," says Anderson, who gained 1,400 yards and scored 18 touchdowns at Hoboken (NJ.) High last year. There is also a $38 million improvement project that includes an 8,000 seat addition to Kenan Stadium, expanding its capacity to 60,000, and a state-of-the-sport fieldhouse containing offices, locker rooms and a weight facility.

But more important than any of that was the decision made by Brown two seasons ago to modernize the Carolina offense and defense. That meant abandoning the option for a pro set on offense and creating an attacking defense that tried to overwhelm rivals with eight- and nine-man fronts and bump-and-run coverage on the outside. He hired Greg Davis from Georgia--his former aide at Tulane--as offensive coordinator to install a sophisticated passing offense and brought aboard Ron Case, a devotee of pressure defense, to coach defensive backs, re-uniting him with long-time UNC defensive boss Carl Torbush, whom Case coached at Carson-Newman.

By the middle of last year, the Tar Heels were unrecognizable from their early-1990s incarnations. They had their first, first-team all-ACC quarterback (junior college transfer Chris Keldorf) since 1974 and the nation's second-rated defense. Their receivers and backs were catching passes, their offensive linemen were protecting the passer, and the defense was registering sacks and creating turnovers. UNC looked like an NFL team, something top high school prospects had to notice.