In NC State sports lore, 1983 holds a special place of prominence and reverence.
The Cardiac Pack. Derrick Whittenburg-to-Lorenzo Charles for the dunk. Jimmy V looking for someone to hug. Mayhem on Hillsborough Street after the Pack shocked the world and won the NCAA championship.
For Western Carolina, NC State’s first football opponent of the new season, the year 1983 also holds great significance.
That was the last year the Catamounts made the playoffs on the gridiron. Yes, it was that long ago.
A few months after NC State cut down the nets in Albuquerque, WCU followed a similar football version of the script — getting hot at the end and blazing their way through the NCAA Division I-AA tournament.
The Catamounts didn’t win the championship. Southern Illinois stopped their run in the title game. But that autumn — which featured a school-best 11-3-1 final record and losses only to Clemson and Wake Forest in the regular season — still beams as a source of great pride in Cullowhee.
There is only one problem with those magical moments from out of the distant past. They also can hang around your neck like an albatross when years and decades go by and they aren’t replicated.
Just ask NC State fans about that. For most of four decades, the Wolfpack couldn’t break through again in hoops (or much of anything in the major sports).
The futility gave rise to the notion of NC State Sh** and the Law of the Wolf (which in this case meant if something could go wrong, it usually did). Triangle media personality Joe Giglio even created a special radio show called “Pack Therapy” to help NCSU faithful cope with the almost predictable letdowns.
But this calendar year brought an end to NC State Sh**. Pack Therapy now involves puffing your chest out in pride after an ACC basketball championship (over UNC), a trip to the Final Four (beating Duke along the way), a College World Series appearance in baseball and Olympic medals in swimming.
Wolfpack sports lore now includes recent moments and personalities. The commemorative red and white T-shirts have current dates.
Things likely haven’t felt that dire at Western Carolina. But it’s an understatement to say Catamounts are hoping to craft a similar chapter to their 2024 football story and end the long playoff drought. WCU has only had 13 winning seasons on the gridiron since the 1983 magic. They’ve never won the Southern Conference since joining in 1977.
Before Kerwin Bell arrived as head coach in 2021, the team had suffered through a pair of three-win campaigns, followed by a 1-8 showing in 2020. The program went 1-10, 1-10 and 2-10 from 2011-13.
But things have been trending up under Bell’s watch. His first squad won four games. The next six. And last year’s group went 7-4, lighting up the scoreboard to the tune of 37.5 points per game and leading the FCS in total yards (504.1 per game).
WCU nearly made the playoffs last fall but untimely injuries and a stumble in the finale against VMI ultimately kept them out.
The energy around the program these days is palpable. Western Carolina enters the season ranked 19th and 20th in the major FCS polls. Quarterback Cole Gonzales has been voted the Southern Conference preseason offensive player of the year and a preseason All-American. The team was voted third in the SoCon, trailing only Chattanooga and Furman, preseason top 10 teams.
A strong cast returns on offense alongside Gonzales, including receiver AJ Colombo, offensive lineman Blake Whitmore and running back Branson Adams. The other side of the ball has been buoyed by the return of eight of the top 11 tacklers and the hiring of Jerry Odom, a nearly three-decade veteran of coaching, to the lead the unit.
“The Catamounts could be primed for a historic season under head coach Kerwin Bell,” a Sports Illustrated/FCS Football Central story beamed earlier this month.
Indeed.
A tough road awaits, though, to put this season into the history books. After Thursday’s opener at NC State (FBS Top 25), the Catamounts have three dates against preseason top 10 teams in their own division — Sept. 21 at No. 3 Montana, Oct. 19 at No. 9 Furman and Nov. 2 at home against No. 8 Chattanooga. Plus, the usual grind through the rest of what is usually an unpredictable conference.
A championship and/or playoff berth would certainly be earned if WCU can successfully navigate the gauntlet.
But the dream is right there in front of the Catamounts. Plenty of ingredients are in place to concoct a memory-making season and paint the western part of our state bright purple by late November and December.
Imagine: Gonzales-to-Colombo for the winning touchdown late in the fourth quarter. Coach Bell running around looking for someone to hug. Celebratory mayhem on campus as the school turns the page to new chapters of success on the gridiron.
Best of all: the year 2024 joining 1983 in both Raleigh AND Cullowhee as one to remember for all the right reasons.
