Why are NC State Fans Neurotic (a la UNC Scandal)

ACC & Other Fans General UNC Scandal54

I always think it’s interesting that people claim NC State fans are so neurotic when it comes to their rivals, UNC.  People like to claim, and some NC State fans have started to buy into it, that UNC doesn’t get any kind of special treatment.  Of course not, it’s all in our heads!  Luckily, recent events have given us a more solid metric to use to explain exactly why NC State fans are so convinced of the massive Carolina bias within the UNC School System and the state in general.

I wanted to compare a few items regarding the Carolina scandal with how NC State handled things back in 1989 and 1990.  I don’t want to belabor the same-old arguments and conversations, but in light of last Saturday’s events, some thoughts came to mind.

NC STATE, Jan 1989 – Oct 1990

The offenses were a non-issue… athletically speaking.  Regardless, NC State’s administration and BOT decided that this was a disgrace to the reputation of NC State to have players selling shoes and tickets.  The result was NC State shooting itself in the foot with a two-year probation and not allowing their team to participate in the 1990 post-season.  NC State acknowledged that they had done nothing wrong by virtue of the NCAA’s investigation, but that the players had acted unethically which required that they act to ensure their credibility as a respected institution continued.  Whether you viewed the self-inflicted wounds as an unecessary crime against Jimmy Valvano and NC State athletics or not, you at least have to acknowledge that NC State was doing what it felt it could, at the time, to correct the corruption within their ranks.

The university system, at large, formed the Poole Commission found that Valvano had “violated the spirit, not the letter of the law.”  In other words, Valvano didn’t actually do anything wrong, but he acted poorly.  The university system decided that Jimmy Valvano could not provided needed oversight over his program which resulted in Jimmy Valvano being asked to resign.  So in addition to what NC State did to themselves, the UNC School System decided it was necessary to get intimately involved with an issue that the NCAA had already ruled a non-issue and that NC State had already taken action to correct.

What’s even more shocking about this harsh punishment by the university at-large and the university system?  NC State actually invited the NCAA to investigate them in the name of being open and honest regarding allegations against their program.  In January of 1989, Athletic Director Jimmy Valvano and Chancellor Bruce Poulton sent a letter to the NCAA asking for the governing body to investigate the NC State program so they could be cleared.  In other words, at the first sight of anyone accusing NC State of being a corrupt program, Jimmy Valvano wanted everyone to know that they had nothing to hide so they invited investigaters to Raleigh voluntarily.  Despite being forth coming, NC State was still subjected to the multiple penalties handed down by the unversity in general and the UNC School System.

Let’s see how UNC is handling things and then compare the two.

UNC, Feb/Mar 2010 – Present

We have been reading for a year and a half about UNC’s handling of their multiple scandals (we are up to 40 or 50 prongs, right?).  Let’s review how this has unfolded…

  • Rumor breaks of investigation… UNC denies any rumors.
  • Evidence found that Austin (and others) took trips and were buy goods with money that wasn’t theirs… UNC has no comment on the matter.
  • Reports of investigators visiting UNC campus… UNC denies any formal investigation is occuring.
  • Reports of connections between John Blake and NFL agents surfaces… UNC denies any formal investigation is occuring, but later on fires Blake.
  • Reports that 9 players had papers written for them by Butch Davis’ nanny surfaces… UNC finally admits there is an investigation, but holds a press conference with both the Chancellor, AD, and Davis to show the university’s support of the coach.
  • Marvin Austin gets suspended indefinitely… UNC conveniently finds the proof that there are traffic violations and vehicles that Austin owned.  The fact that UNC only decided to release these papers AFTER he was suspended is… how long did they have these records BEFORE he was suspended?
  • FOIA requests required a court to order UNC to comply… UNC releases partial information (with redactions).
  • Money trail between Associate Head Coach and agents released to public… UNC begins the “rogue coach” defense.
  • Media begins to question UNC and ask for interviews (July 2011)… UNC refuses to be interviewed.
  • UNC fires Butch Davis, Baddour agrees to resign, Thorp lives… UNC still claims that Davis didn’t know anything and this is a problem with rogue players (even though such a scenario would mean there is no reason to fire their head coach).

That’s just the brief summary of things that occured and UNC’s response (and I left a TON of details out).  What have we NOT seen from the UNC investigation?

1)  What NEVER occurred was for UNC to step up in the early spring of 2010, when rumors first broke, and publicly state, “These are the accusations against us… PLEASE come investigate us and clean this up!”  (Recall, this is exactly what NC State did back in January of 1989 before an NCAA investigation had begun.)
2) What has NOT occurred is UNC acknowledge that something is going on. They have also never admitted that either they, or the university system, need to conduct their own internal investigation for the purpose of assessing potential further-reaching penalties against individuals within the university who may escape punishment from the NCAA. (Recall, both NC State AND the UNC School System investigated the NC State basketball program IN ADDITION to anything the NCAA did.)

COMPARING AND CONTRASTING PROGRAMS

What you have in NC State is a program that initially heard reports of wrong doing in their athletic program, responded immediately to clear it’s name, had a university adminsitration/BOT that felt strong enough about the unethical details of the case that they needed to punish themselves beyond what the NCAA found, and a UNC School System who was proactive and willing to investigate NC State, resulting in pressuring the program to “ask one of it’s best coaches to resign”.

Let’s contrast that with Carolina.

Carolina, according to the Notice of Allegations, had received reports of academic impropriety and willingly failed to check-up on these reports.  There is also the issue that Marvin Austin was publicly posting, via twitter, his trips and gifts he was receiving and no one said a word from within Carolina’s walls.  There’s difference #1 between NC State and Carolina: taking initiative to be honest with their fans, the public, and the acadmic institution, itself.

Carolina has also closed ranks throughout the investigation.  Looking forward, it makes you wonder if Carolina has any intentions of even considering further punishments above-and-beyond what the NCAA deals out.  The NOA already failed to mention the rumored “Loss of Institutional Control”, and many fans of Carolina and rivals alike are claiming that UNC will get off light.  If us mere mortals realize this, doesn’t the Carolina administration and BOT realize this as well?  I wouldn’t place any bets that Carolina will do any sort of self-investigation beyond what the NCAA gives them.  There’s difference #2: NC State self-evaluated their athletic program to evaluate if any additional sanctions needed to be placed on the basketball team while Carolina is doing anything it can to downplay the importance of any one individual allegation.

The final difference between NC State and UNC I wanted to bring up was how the UNC School System has acted throughout this whole ordeal.  There have been a couple of state officials speaking out, but for the most part we haven’t heard any plans for the UNC School System to support the creation of a state-appointed commission, similar to the Poole Commission, to investigate what Carolina did or didn’t do.  If NC State had to be responsible to the tax payers via public commission, so does Carolina.  There’s difference #3: NC State played by a set of rules that was founded under the auspice of being a responsible institution.  A commission was put in place to determine if anything additional to what the NCAA and NC State, internally, had found.  Does anyone seriously think that Carolina will be held to the same procedural standard?

Carolina is just “different” from NC State, athletically and administratively.  For years, NC State has had to operate under a system built to put them at a disadvantage.  Hell, from NC State’s beginnings they weren’t given any funding to hire faculty, and the relationship hasn’t sweetened much since then.  That’s one thing, but when it comes to things that are unethical (gifts, parties, etc) and even illegal (unpaid parking tickets, switching plates on vehicles, etc), NC State is held to a standard where even if they do everything they can to be an open book to the NCAA and even if that investigation yeilds no violations, we must still self-inflict wounds that cripple our athletic program and allow the UNC School System to conduct further investigations “just to make sure we’ve been punished enough”.  Show of hands: who feels like UNC is being held, and will be held, to the same standard.  Anyone?  Anyone!?

And THAT, my friends, is why NC State fans have every right in the world to be just a tad neurotic.

———-

If you are interested in more history between UNC and NC State that explains why NC State fans have every reason to be pissed off at Carolina, you may want to check out my other article on UNC that explains the history in NC State’s founding and the resistance our beloved State College faced.

About NCStatePride

***ABOUT THE AUTHOR: NCStatePride has been writing for StateFansNation.com since 2010 and is a 2009 graduate of the College of Engineering.

ACC & Other Fans General UNC Scandal

54 Responses to Why are NC State Fans Neurotic (a la UNC Scandal)

  1. LoCoPack 09/09/2011 at 5:28 PM #

    Thank you NCStatePride. You can take credit for one more registered user. I graduated in ’78 and my freshman year was the fall after the ’74 NC. It was much different then than it has been for the last twenty years. It has been difficult to watch what has happened to the Pack over the years but as you all know there is no choice but to pull for the Pack.
    Although I have not been a resident of NC since ’78 I hope the pressure continues and that the “Carolina Way” is finally exposed.
    Your post captures what many of us have felt and I can only hope that it is read and understood outside NC. Thanks for your post to the best fan site on the net.
    GO PACK and GO TO HELL CAROLINA!

  2. gcpack 09/09/2011 at 5:40 PM #

    NCStatePride in your article from last year on the foundation of the rivalry between the two schools you had two sources. One was the history of the larger University of North Carolina which I was able to download for later review.

    Your second was a catalog from the late 1930’s that you referred to with this comment “It’s also worth mentioning that Land Grant funding was originally being given to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, but somehow disappeared once it came time to establish a “partner” institution.”

    I want to locate that information in this ‘catalog’ but can’t find it and cannot download it. Could you tell me where in this late 1930’s catalog I can find this and where can I download this entire document?

    Thanks.

    As an aside in regards to the Valvano/NCAA period I have two reliable verbal sources bookended by a twenty year period about the real reason that the Raleigh News & Observer went after V, all the while using the sensationalistic and manufactured ‘facts’ from Personal Fouls. Which by the way was a book looking for a scandal to support Frank Daniels’ and subsequently the News & Observer’s witch hunt to destroy Valvano.

    The two sources validate each other’s comments that Frank Daniels was completely insulted and no doubt embarrased by Jim Valvano’s refusal of an invitation by Daniel’s to Valvano to join one of the most exclusive, if not the most exclusive, social club in Raleigh. Valvano refused for a very honorable reason and that being that his entire coaching staff would not be welcome in the ’80’s to join him at that club in the dining room because some of his staff were African-American. This information I have no doubt from my two sources is accurate.

    This second part I feel is how the rest played out but is only speculation on my part. Frank Daniels, a man who had an ego the size of the battleship North Carolina, was never used to hearing the word “No”. As a result he decided that the only way to ‘adjust’ this embarrasing position that he was put into by V turning down an invitation from ‘The Great One’ was to manufacture and then blow out of proportion any damning charges he could logically muster up between him and Golenback. I believe Golenback was nothing but a hired hand by Daniels. That would allow Daniels to say he wasn’t the source of the conjured up charges yet allowing him and his bird cage liner, the N&O, to be the ONLY publication in the country to have an advanced copy of the liner notes and therefore over promote a book that NO major publisher would touch. So Frank Daniels, his ego and reputation at the social club having taken a hit, decides he can only make things right by going after V. It is a chicken sh__t thing to do but that is what alot of the media publishers do when they have a person agenda to promote. And Frank Daniels was a master at using his paper to achieve his personal goals be damned of whether it benefited the greater public good.

    Could I be wrong? Possibly. Is it impossible that this is how the Valvano character assasination played out. Absolutely not.

  3. MrPlywood 09/09/2011 at 5:43 PM #

    @ GC – one of the MOST obnoxious pro-UNX slurpers on the ESPN boards is a UNC-G student! The guy is insufferable, knows about 2 years worth of history and parrots the party line when it come to UNX bball, fball, BMFD, etc. etc. I would say that his profile matches 85% of the pro-UNX crowd.

    @ concordwolf – I firmly believe that there was a connection between the stress and V’s cancer. I have thought it all along.

    re: neurotic – not neurotic, just exhausted. The whole BMFD game-ball fiasco is just the latest example of a system run amok, with no checks and balances. I can’t do no more.

  4. ancsu87 09/10/2011 at 1:11 AM #

    As a 1987 graduate of NC State and one who lived through the era also GCPack hit the nail on the head. That is one issue that no one wanted to “follow-up” but was well known.

    I knew Valvano personally only because he met my mother at a stop in Belk’s in summer of 1983. She told him that her son went to NC State. At the beginning of 1983 Fall semester I got a call in the hall phone in my dorm at Tucker and was asked to come to his office for a meeting with him if I wanted. At that meeting he asked me if I would be interested in being part of a new section on his weekly TV show where he would showcase the different schools and students of the university.

    He loved NC State and did everything he could to make us the premier university in the state not just in athletics but in all aspects. He was known and liked throughout the country. Hell look up the number of increased applications received in the years following the “dunk”. Poulton knew that Valvano was selling more than the school’s athletic program which was why he supported him.

    I disagree with Mike. The book was trash. Yes there were students selling shoes and tickets but there was also lots of stuff going on over a UNC-CH that was keep quiet that I know about. I got to know Valvano and knew that one thing he hated was the race issue and he did not tolerate anybody who used race or was racist. The book was, at most, 10% true. It was not close to 8 fish at 2 lbs versus 8 fish at 10 lbs..it was more like 2 fish at 2 lbs versus 20 fish at 20 lbs.

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