- BEST IN STATE -

Fabulous 14: The nine remaining unbeaten teams top our rankings this week

Duke, UNC, NC Central lead the way after second weekend of games

Eric Lusk

Published

September 12, 2023

NC Central remains high in our Fabulous 14 rankings after defeating rival NC A&T on Saturday in Greensboro. (Photo by Doug Burt | courtesy of NC Central University athletics).

“Winning isn’t everything, but it beats anything that comes in second.” – Paul “Bear” Bryant

“The critics are always right. The only way you shut them up is by winning.” – Chuck Noll

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A couple of weeks ago, 35 college football programs from across North Carolina embarked on a adventurous journey called the 2023 season.

Already, nearly three-quarters of the teams have suffered at least one defeat.

Heading into this weekend’s action, only nine unbeatens remain in the Old North State — eight teams with 2-0 records and one team, which started the season late, with a 1-0 mark.

Winning is hard, even when you have quality players and coaches. The margin between the thrill of victory and agony of defeat can be razor thin (can we get an “Amen!” from the folks in Boone?).

With that in mind, we’re rewarding the nine teams that remain unscathed with the top nine spots in this week’s Best In State Fabulous 14 rankings.

That’s right, we see you Division III Guilford College, equaling your win total from all of last season. High fives to you D2 Barton College, knocking off an FCS team on the road. Tip of the cap to you Catawba and your record-setting quarterback (Preston Brown), who threw six touchdown passes in only his second collegiate game appearance.

Since winning is our theme for the week, we’ll hand out four of the remaining five spots to the other squads that earned victories this past week — Western Carolina (upsetting a top-10 opponent), Gardner-Webb (scoring in the final seconds to fend off Elon), Campbell (scoring early and often at The Citadel) and Elizabeth City State (pitching a shutout in an HBCU classic).

The final spot in our Fabulous 14 goes Appalachian State. Why?

The Mountaineers didn’t beat North Carolina on the field on Saturday (falling 40-34 in a double overtime heartbreak) but they did win big in the pubic relations realm when Tar Heels coach Mack Brown said out loud that he never wanted to play the scrappy bunch from Boone ever again. That’s a sign you’ve built a Fabulous program.

A few reminders about our Fabulous 14 before we unveil our full list:

Each week we include at least one school from each of the major divisions of play (FBS, FCS, D2, D3/NAIA/JUCO).
It’s less about who we think would win head-to-head and more about the kind of splash teams are making in their own realm, hence the unique mix and order of teams.
Teams can’t have a losing record and be on the list. You might be good if you’re under .500 but not yet Fabulous.
Why 14? It’s a football number = two touchdowns and two extra points worth of teams to highlight each week.

The Fabulous 14 | After Week 2

14. Elizabeth City State | D2 | 1-1

The Vikes defense held St. Augustine’s off the scoreboard and running back Zechariah Adams-Duckson earned CIAA weekly honors after a 179-yard rushing day in the Down East Viking Classic in Rocky Mount.

13. Campbell | FCS | 1-1

We think quarterback Hajj-Malik Williams just scored again. One of the CAA stat-stuffers for the week accounted for five touchdowns in a 56-7 rout of The Citadel on the road. Williams is completing 81 percent of his throws so far.

12. Gardner-Webb | FCS | 1-1

The Bulldogs fought off a late Elon comeback with the winning touchdown and a key interception in the final minute. Ty French now has the Big South career sack record all to himself.

11. Appalachian State | FBS | 1-1

We’ll let Mack Brown’s words speak as to why the Mountaineers are on our list this week: “Nobody lost this game. Those (App State) kids deserve a lot of credit for going on the road, fighting their guts out, and playing down to the end. (I’m) really proud for those guys as well. They fought their guts out. I’m glad that we don’t play them again.”

10. Western Carolina | FCS | 1-1

The Catamounts honored the 1983 team that made it to the I-AA championship. Then, the current team earned a 30-7 upset victory over 8th-ranked Samford worthy of that legendary group’s praise. Too bad the AFCA voters somehow missed it, leaving Samford ranked No. 14 and Western Carolina out in the cold in their weekly rankings.

9. Mars Hill | D2 | 1-0

The Lions didn’t start their season until the Thursday after Labor Day. The wait proved worth it, and Mars Hill knocked off Wingate (winners of 11 games last season) at home in a 15-10 defensive struggle.

8. Guilford | D3 | 2-0

The Quakers raced out to a 32-0 lead over Methodist and cruised home to a comfortable victory. Guilford went 2-8 a year ago. Feeling pretty good right now after two wins against in-state rivals (including the Soup Bowl over Greensboro).

7. Catawba | D2 | 2-0

QB Preston Brown’s stat line against Livingstone bears repeating: 24-of-30 for 372 yards and a school-record six touchdown passes, Catawba won just once a year ago in 11 tries. Brown never saw the field in his first three years of college ball at Charlotte in 2020-21, then Catawba last season.

6. Barton | D2 | 2-0

Social media buzzed all weekend over the Bulldogs’ 33-31 defeat at Davidson (an FCS playoff team a year ago). QB Jaquan Lynch and RB Jordan Terrell proved a potent combo on the ground, with two touchdowns each.

5. Lenoir-Rhyne | D2 | 2-0

The Bears turned three first-half turnovers into points and held defending CIAA champion Fayetteville State in check, moving up several spots to 17th and 20th in the two major Division II national polls. LR now sits on top of our Division II statewide rankings.

4. Wake Forest | FBS | 2-0

ACC beat writer Brett Friedlander wrote this about the Deacs this week: “It’s a mystery as to why expectations are always lower than they should be. Size isn’t everything. Rather than concentrating on Wake having the smallest enrollment among Power 5 schools, more attention should be paid to what Dave Clawson has done with his program over the past decade … It usually takes until the Deacons get off to a 2-0 start, something they’ve now done in 7 of the past 8 years, for their expectations to be raised as high as they should have been in the first place.”

3. North Carolina Central | FCS | 2-0

The Eagles, who pulled away from rival NC A&T in the second half to stay unbeaten, will get rewarded with a trip to the Rose Bowl this week (the stadium, not the bowl game) to face UCLA. Great exposure for North Carolina’s highest ranked HBCU program.

2. North Carolina | FBS | 2-0

Mack Brown once coached at Appalachian State. Since 2019, he’s coached in three barn-burners against the Sun Belt stalwarts, winning the last two by a whisker. “I encourage NC State, East Carolina, and all of those people to schedule them and play them … I’ve had enough … I’ll enjoy my house in Linville and brag on all the App State players and coaches, but I’m glad we’re through.”

1. Duke | FBS | 2-0

Quarterbacks Riley Leonard and Henry Belin IV combined to go 20-for-20 in the passing game, a difficult feat even against a lesser opponent like Lafayette. Blue Devils still have the biggest win of the season in our state, topping Clemson at home on Labor Day, 28-7. Are expectations on the rise in Durham? They should be.