Filed under: UNC, ACC, Bowl Games
CHAPEL HILL, N.C. -- This was the season that could have been for North Carolina's football team, the year the Tar Heels and their fans thought they might finally bask in the limelight of national recognition. Instead, there was only the glaring light of dual NCAA investigations on a program suddenly on the verge of embarrassment, not greatness.Amid player suspensions and dismissals that came down weekly for academic misconduct or accepting improper gifts from agents, it was too much to expect the Tar Heels to challenge for the Atlantic Coast Conference and a BCS bid as some predicted they would before the scandals hit.
But if the program was scarred by the investigations, it was not defeated. And that is the other significant story of this roller-coaster North Carolina season. The Tar Heels overcame the suspensions or dismissals involving 14 players, and injuries that affected 21 more, to finish a surprisingly respectable 7-5 and earn a bowl bid in a season that could have been much, much worse.
The Music City Bowl Dec. 30 in Nashville, Tenn., might not be the BCS showcase the Tar Heels once aspired to, but it's sweet redemption for a team many wrote off.
"I am probably more pleased and happier with the way the season went than probably most of you could imagine,'' said coach Butch Davis as the team prepared to face Tennessee (6-6). "In 37 years of coaching, I don't know that I've ever been around a group of kids that have been as resilient, as hard working, as willing to buy into doing whatever it was gonna take, sacrifices they were gonna have to make, the ability to block out distractions to focus on the things that they could control and play and compete as hard as they could.
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