As we head into the 2007 NC State football season, the N&O posted a blog entry to “Close the book” on the fun that has been then the Chuck “The Chest” Amato vs John “The Belly” Bunting rivalry of the last seven years. If you want to do some reviewing of our comments in the past then please feel free to use our search feature and have some fun!
The N&O’s numbers don’t mean much now, but it is always interesting to have this kind of information at your fingertips.
As expected, Amato pretty much dominates the head to head statistics with the only real bright spot for Bunting coming in the head to head competition in the Wolfpack-Tarheel rivalry where Bunting was able to take advantage of the last three years of Amato’s growing ineptitude. Of course, Bunting had an awful lot of help in one game that - had Amato gotten the deserved W - would have turned Amato’s winning percentage in the rivalry to the positive and Bunting’s to the negative.
That pic of Amato after the ECU game ( I think) tells the story. Looking at him, I was glad we have a new staff and energy.
If “FAILURE” is Belly’s caption, “HUBRIS” ought to be Amato’s….
It’s like comparing Ishtar to Waterworld, really. Does it really matter which was worse?
Compared to 3 of the last 7 years, Waterworld was Oscar material!!
Coach Amato’s record would be slightly better if we could have played Duke every year…I think.
Clark, I remember last season hearing Frank Dascenzo (Durham Herald-Sun) on the radio lamenting that Duke didn’t get to play State because Duke would win the game.
I wish there was a post on “Chuck-isms”
The most important thing I learned from CTC was “Football is a game of inches”.. simple yet so profound.
LOL RAWFS! I remember hearing that A LOT from the dukies! Sadly enough…it may have been true! I mean who knows if they would have beat us, but I would bet my house we wouldnt have scored more than 1 touchdown!
I have to say that I will miss the personalities a little. I mean there is no question that both UNC and ourselves have much, much better coaches, but I just hope this doesnt become a sickening love-fest. I mean some of the comments from media day were a little disturbing….too much touchy-feely stuff b/w Davis and TOB for me!
Question: If Amato had won the “TA game”…is he still here?
That would have made us 6-5 (not 5-6) that season, so it would have been us, not UNC, probably losing to BC in Charlotte.
Would we have fired Amato after last season if he had been coming off a streak of 6 straight bowl appearances?
^ Would we have hired Amato had MOC not managed an improbably loss to UNC in the “TB @ QB” debacle game in Charlotte?
roandaddy Says:
August 29th, 2007 at 9:47 am
I wish there was a post on “Chuck-isms”
The most important thing I learned from CTC was “Football is a game of inches”.. simple yet so profound.
That was Vince Lombardi I believe.
“Football is a game of inches and inches make a champion.”
I wish the n&o and this site would end the book on amato.
he’s a good person who was bad head coach, end of story. let it go.
94wolfpack……that’s what she said!!!! hagrawhagrawhahaha!!!!!!
Chuck you WISH that is what she said
Beyond the numbers, under Amato we have sold out almost all of our LTRs and had 7 or 8 consecutive sellouts. Amato made football at NC State a big deal. I didn’t experience the Sheridan or Holts eras, but Amato changed NC State football significantly in terms of the passion of our fans. Usually about an hour before kickoff in CF(I am in the Stadium SE lot), I look around at all the people, grills, tents, flags, food and drinks and am just wowed by our tailgating atmoshphere. I know there are bigger atmoshpheres at some SEC & Big 10 schools, but taking out “size” as a factor we have absolutely one of the best tailgating scenes in America. It is still hard to believe that College Gameday actually made an appearance in Raleigh.
It wasn’t like that before Chuck Amato. Obviously Chuck had his faults and didn’t win enough games, but his impact on NC State football was significant IMO. There were more monetary commitments made to NC State athletics during the Chuck Amato era than at any other time. Certainly he doesn’t deserve 100% credit for the mass sums of money in large donations(Murphy, Dail, etc..), but IMO he deserves a large portion of the credit for the commitments made by the masses in the form of LTRs. And because of the LTR aspect of the commitments that support for Wolfpack football likely won’t ever go away. Amato changed the mindset of NC State fans and got us to start thinking “big”. Amato also changed how we were perceived nationally as going 7-5 is now underachievement for NC State.
In these regarnds, it is totally unfair to mention Bunting in the same sentence as Chuck Amato.
I saw this quote from Dana Bible earlier this week who coached here during the Tom Reed era IIRC and this quote illustrates the impact Chuck Amato had on NC State Football-
It’s definitely not the same place. I will tell you one other thing that is different – there is just a really positive vibe surrounding NC State football that wasn’t here before. There is just really good energy in the area. That’s one of the big differences that hit me as quickly as we got here.