UNC vs. NC State Postgame Notes

Posted Dec 1, 2019
North Carolina improves to 6-6 on the season and finishes 4-4 in the ACC. The Tar Heels are bowl eligible for the first time since the 2016 season when UNC played in the Sun Bowl against Stanford. UNC is 67-36-6 all-time against NC State by earning its first win in the series since 2015. The road team has won six of the last seven meetings.

• Mack Brown improves to 75-53-1 as head coach at North Carolina and 250-128-1 all-time in 31 seasons. He is the active wins leader in college football, and his 250 wins rank 10th on the NCAA all-time list for coaches with at least 10 years at an FBS institution. He won 158 games at Texas, 75 at Carolina, 11 at Tulane and six at App State.

• Brown is now 6-7 against NC State. All six wins have come as head coach with the Tar Heels.

• The 41-10 victory is the largest margin of victory ever for North Carolina in Raleigh. The previous record was a 30-0 victory in 1901. The margin was also the largest against NC State since a 52-20 victory in Chapel Hill in 1996. The coach that season for the Tar Heels was Mack Brown.

• Fewest points allowed to the Wolfpack since a 23-9 win in Chapel Hill in 2006.

• The 28 points scored in the third quarter were the most in a single quarter by UNC since putting up 35 points in the second quarter against Western Carolina in the 2018 season.

• The four-touchdown third quarter marked the first time Carolina has scored four in a quarter against a Power 5 team since tallying five in the first quarter of the 2015 game at NC State.

• Carolina allowed only 17 points in the last two games to close out the regular season. It’s the fewest points allowed by UNC over a two-game span since the 2012 season when the Tar Heels gave up a combined six points against ECU (6) and Idaho (0).

• Sam Howell become only the fifth Tar Heel quarterback to throw for 3,000 yards in a season. He has 3,347 yards in 2019, the fourth most in a season at UNC. He joins an exclusive list that includes Mitch Trubisky (3,748, 2016), T.J. Yates (3,418, 2010), Bryn Renner (3,356, 2012 & 3,086, 2011) and Marquise Williams (3,072, 2015 & 3,068, 2014).

• Howell has tied Deshaun Watson (Clemson, 2015) for the fourth most TD passes (35) in a single season in ACC history.

• Howell threw for a season-high 401 yards on 23 of 33 passing with three touchdowns and one interception. The 401 yards passing is the ninth most in Tar Heel football history, and the most at Carolina since Mitch Trubisky had 405 yards versus Florida State in 2016.

• Howell’s passing TD total is believed to be the most by a true freshman in FBS history. He moved past Trevor Lawrence’s 30 TDs for Clemson in 2018 last week against Mercer.

• Howell’s 35 touchdowns are the second most ever by an ACC freshman quarterback. He now only trails FSU’s Jamies Winston, who had 40 touchdown passes in his red-shirt season of 2013.

• Howell threw multiple touchdowns for the 12th straight game to begin his career. He is tied with Ohio State's Justin Fields for the longest active streak in FBS.

• Howell has seven games with three or more passing touchdowns in his true freshman campaign.

• RB Javonte Williams scored three touchdowns alone in the third quarter. Two came on the ground and one through the air. Williams is the first Tar Heel player with two rushing touchdowns and a receiving touchdown in the same game since Marquise Williams at Georgia Tech on Oct. 3, 2015.

• RB Michael Carter rushed for a team-high 97 yards and now has 919 yards for the season, the most at Carolina since Elijah Hood had 1,463 yards in 2015. His 2,075 career rushing yards rank No. 15 on the Carolina career rushing list.

• WR Dyami Brown hauled in his 11th receiving TD of the season in the third quarter. He ranks second in the ACC in receiving touchdowns and his season total is the second most in a single season at Carolina. Hakeem Nicks (12 in 2008) and Dwight Jones (12 in 2011) and are the only two players ahead of Brown.

• Dazz Newsome hauled in a 57-yard reception in the second quarter for the longest catch of his career. That topped the 55-yard reception last season at Syracuse. Newsome went over 100 receiving yards for the fourth time in his last five games (DNP vs. Mercer last week).

• Brown (150 yards) and Newsome (130) become the first set of Tar Heels to go over 100 receiving yards in the same game since Duke in 2015: Mack Hollins (165) and Ryan Switzer (106).

• Brown and Newsome have exactly 947 receiving yards this season.

• PK Noah Ruggles made his sixth- and seventh-consecutive FG attempt in the second quarter. He missed a 55-yard attempt just before halftime to conclude his career long streak of made field goal attempts.

• LB Chazz Surratt had another big game on defense. He had his sixth game with double-figure tackles after coming up with 10 stops. He also had a sack and 2.0 TFLs.