Updated @ 10pm ET
GoPack.com has released NC State’s 2006 Football Schedule. Please don’t hold it against them if they don’t update the schedule ever again, it wouldn’t be “nice” to expect anything like that of them. (Evidently, the website’s listing of last night’s basketball game against Seton Hall did not include the television listing for ESPNClassic and some Wolfpack fans missed watching the game).
The 2006 schedule can be seen by clicking here. The N&O is talking about the schedule here. We’ll clean it up and have more discussion on it in the future. But, just wanted to put it out there for now. Some quick bytes accompany this at the bottom of the entry.
09/02/06 Appalachian State
09/09/06 Akron (12noon – ESPNU)
09/16/06 @ Southern Mississippi
09/23/06 Boston College
10/05/06 Florida State (Thursday night – ESPN)
10/14/06 Wake Forest
10/21/06 @ Maryland
10/28/06 @ Virginia
11/04/06 Georgia Tech
11/11/06 @ Clemson
11/18/06 @ North Carolina
11/25/06 East Carolina
Quick Observations
* The home vs away component of the schedule is very unbalanced. State plays five of their first six games in the friendly confines of Carter-Finley Stadium. That also happens to be the hottest part of the season. I hope that the geniuses in Raleigh remember that there are no rules against playing games at night.
* It is nice to see the Carolina game moved closer to the end of the season. It adds to relevance, magnitude, and excitement to both the game, and the entire season.
* Scheduling the ECU game (against the Ugliest Uniforms in America) so late in the season does nothing but add more relevance & magnitude to a series that doesn’t deserve. What a mistake.
* No Miami…no Virginia Tech…but, no Duke. We play the meat of the Coastal Division and we play 2 of 3 games vs the Coastal Division on the road.
* One Thursday night game against Florida State in Raleigh.
* From September 16th until the end of the last game of the season…this schedule is brutal.
* Open weekend is the end of September (9/30).
* A seven-win or six-win season in 2006 will indicate the program has AT BEST stalled. Less than six wins and the program is in very deep trouble.
* The last time that NC State ended a football season with back-to-back games against North Carolina and East Carolina, NC State fired coach, Mike O’Cain.
* For real shits-and-giggles, ‘what if’ Skip Holtz was having a fantastic year at East Carolina and Chuck Amato was having a horrible year at NC State. Could we be watching Skip’s last game on the sideline in Greenville prior to taking the head job in Raleigh? It is not beyond the realm of possibility…but, it is nothing more than fun fan talk right now.
* To ^that same point – is it 1999 again? Remember in year seven of Mike O’Cain’s tenure at NC State the Wolfpack ended the season with back-to-back games against Carolina and East Carolina. State lost them both. O’Cain was fired. After three years of under-achievement compared to talent and expectations, is Chuck Amato on strong enough footing to weather a similar fate if he were to lose both of these games?
Flashback
For kicks — last year’s football schedule was announced on January 20th and the entry (and conversation) can be found by clicking here.
