Duke, Featured stories, N.C. State, The skinny, UNC

ACC Week 4 football summaries: State embarrassed, Heels can’t stop GT

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Cincinnati 44, NC State 14
RB Isaiah Pead rushed for 167 yards on 27 carries and Cincinnati held NC State (2-2, 0-1 ACC) to minus-26 yards on the
ground in pulling away from the Wolfpack in an ESPN Thursday Night game. In defeat, the Pack’s T.J. Graham accounted for
336 all-purpose yards, a school record and the fifth-highest total in ACC history. David Amerson made his fourth interception
of the year; his total is tied for the national lead.

Georgia Tech 35, North Carolina 28
QB Tevin Washington’s 5-yard run with 5:20 to play capped a 61-yard drive that immediately followed the Tar Heels’ tying
touchdown, and the Yellow Jackets (1-0 ACC) won their ACC opener to improve to 4-0 for the first time since their national
championship season of 1990. North Carolina (3-1, 1-1 ACC) drew even at 28-28 when freshman Giovani Bernard bolted up
the middle for a 55-yard touchdown midway through the fourth quarter. Tech, the nation’s leader in total offense, required
only four plays for the go-ahead score, and pressure on Tar Heel QB Bryn Renner sealed the outcome.

Temple 38, Maryland 7
RB Bernard Pierce ran for 149 yards and five touchdowns for the Owls, who led 31-0 at halftime in handing the Terrapins
their second straight defeat at home. QB Chester Stewart complemented Pierce’s ground game by going 9-for-9 for 140
yards through the air. The Terps’ TD came on an 18-yard pass from backup QB C.J. Brown to Devonte Campbell in the
fourth quarter.

Boston College 45, Massachusetts 17
The Eagles tied an ACC and NCAA record by returning two fumbles for touchdowns, and they welcomed back RB Montel
Harris in a victory over the Minutemen. The Eagles led 24-10 late in the third quarter before the critical sequence. WR Colin
Larmond’s second TD catch of the day from QB Chase Rettig was immediately followed by a fumble that the Eagles’ Nick
Clancy took in for a 16-yard score. Moments later, LB Kevin Pierre-Louis grabbed the ball out of the air and went 96 yards
for another Boston College touchdown. Harris ran for 27 yards in limited action.

Clemson 35, Florida State 30
QB Tajh Boyd passed for 344 yards and three touchdowns as the Tigers (4-0, 1-0 ACC) withstood the Seminoles’ bid to
overcome a double-digit halftime deficit. On three occasions, FSU (2-2, 0-1 ACC) made it a one-score game behind backup
QB Clint Trickett, who threw for three TDs of his own. The Tigers responded every time, going up 35-23 on Boyd’s 62-yard
TD toss to freshman Sammy Watkins and sacking Trickett in the final minute to end the Noles’ final attempt.

Virginia Tech 30, Marshall 10
RB David Wilson ran for 132 yards and Josh Oglesby scored on two short runs as the Hokies defeated the Thundering
Herd in the ACC’s first game at Marshall. Wilson has now rushed for 100 or more yards in three of Virginia Tech’s first four
games, and the Hokies are 4-0 for the fi rst time since 2006. Danny Coale caught seven passes for 107 yards for the Hokies
and stands in the Top 10 in career receptions and yardage in Hokie history.

Duke 48, Tulane 27
RB Juwan Thompson and QB Sean Renfree ran for two TDs apiece for the Blue Devils (2-2, 1-0 ACC), whose defense didn’t
allow a touchdown until the fourth quarter. The Devils amassed five scores on the ground, and Renfree completed 21-of-30
passes for 278 yards, finding Conner Vernon (six catches) and Donovan Varner (four) for nearly half of his completions. The
win was Duke’s most lopsided over an FBS team outside the ACC since a 43-17 win at Navy on Sept. 28, 2002.

Kansas State 28, Miami 24
Southern Mississippi 30, Virginia 24
QB Austin Davis completed 27-of-41 passes for 313 yards and three touchdowns for the Golden Eagles, who dropped the
Cavaliers (2-2, 0-1 ACC) to their second straight loss. The Cavs sliced the deficit to 27-24 when QB David Watford hit TE Jeremiah Mathis for a 1-yard score with 5:18 left, but the Eagles converted a third-and-24 situation on their next drive, which
consumed nearly four minutes and ended with a field goal. USM stopped Virginia on downs to end the game.

Featured stories, The skinny

Week 6 questions include: Can Fuquay, Middle Creek win big home games?

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Week 6 of the high school football season brings about several games that could shake up conference standings. The Tri-9 Conference could all but be decided already if Middle Creek can beat Cary. It will be warm, in the low 70s, but with a 60 percent chance of rain or thunder storms. Here are 10 football games being played tonight that are within driving distance in the Triangle area. Most games are at 7:30 p.m. You might want to check with local officials as some games start at 7. In bold below are the predicted winners. Last week my record was 7-3 for a 36-14 season mark for a 72 percent correct rate.

Athens Drive at Holly Springs

Carrboro at Chapel Hill

Cary at Middle Creek

Cedar Ridge at Cardinal Gibbons

East Chapel Hill at Durham Riverside

East Wake at Garner

Enloe at Wake Forest-Rolesville

Green Hope at Apex

Northern Durham at Durham Jordan

Panther Creek at Fuquay-Varina

Featured stories, The skinny, UNC

Former UNC football player says sanctions too severe

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Former UNC safety Deunta Williams says the NCAA is working on speculation and that the Carolina administration was naive in handing everything over and thus are getting it worse that Auburn and Ohio State, which didn’t cooperate as much.

Speaking on 99.9 The Fan radio Tuesday, he said, “I don’t think we deserved to get it that bad, as bad as we got it,” Williams said. “I really feel like the NCAA is capitalizing off a situation that isn’t fair to a lot of people.”

UNC’s self imposed sanctions, in hopes of the NCAA going lightly on them with further penalties, includes forfeiting games from 2008 and 2009 and giving up scholarships.

“If you take a microscope, the same microscope that they did with us, and look at every team in the NCAA, I guarantee it will shake up the foundation that we have right now. There are a lot of teams out there that are doing a lot worse than we’re doing,” he said. “O-State, Miami – their guy goes on record snitches on every player that was good there. It seems like it gets brushed under the bridge a little bit. Every time we turned around, our names and our families were getting questioned, everything was on ESPN. It just seems like its not fair, and I understand that guys broke the rules and they deserved what happened but it just seems like the magnitude that they went at Carolina these past two years was a little crazy.”

Featured stories, N.C. State, The skinny

Beat up Pack travels to Cincinnati for a Thursday night game

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Last season, N.C. State handled Cincinnati at home 30-19 in a game that wasn’t that close. But this season the Wolfpack must travel to Cincinnati for an ESPN Thursday night game this week, and State coach Tom O’Brien expects the Bearcats to be better.

O’Brien notes that Cincinnati has the quarterback, receivers and most of the line back on offense and 10 of 11 starters back on defense. “The difference is they’ve played for a year in that system so now they’re more into Coach (Butch) Jones’ style of play,” he said. “It was his third game last year where now he’s been there for a year. They’re much more aggressive up front on both sides of the ball at the line of scrimmage coming off the ball than they were a year ago. They’re attacking more on defense. They’ve made big strides. “

The Bearcats are 1-1 after being beaten 45-23 by Tennessee while State is 2-1 after defeating South Alabama 35-13.

But the Pack is beat up.

Linebacker Terrell Manning injured his knee last week and will be out at least three weeks.

“It’s been a tough season to play defense,” said O’Brien, a Cincinnati native. “We lost a corner to start the year, we lost our captain and best defensive lineman, we lost the next-best defensive lineman, we lost the back-up middle linebacker, lost a corner, lost a linebacker.”

With the game being on Thursday, it will be a short week for the Pack to prepare shorthanded.

“If you’re a veteran team it’s better rather than if you’re in our situation where you have some young guys that we’re trying to get locked in, in case they have to go in the game,” O’Brien said.

Featured stories, The skinny

Mudcats announcer Kinas named broadcaster of the year

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The Southern League of Professional Baseball Clubs is pleased to announce that Patrick Kinas has been named its 2011 Radio Broadcaster of the Year, as selected by his peers and the league’s general managers.

Kinas has been broadcasting for the Carolina Mudcats since 1999 and was honored with this same award in 2003. Since 2009, he has been president of Play-By-Play Sports Properties which is involved in several national broadcast and sponsorship events spanning baseball, football and other multi-media projects.

Starting at the age of 14, Kinas called high school football and basketball games in Pontiac, IL. Then, he went on to call these same sports at Millikin University in Illinois where he also interned at WGN. While earning his M.A. from Northwestern University, he interned at WSCR.

Kinas was a broadcaster for the Clinton Lumberkings and the Kane County Cougars of the Midwest League before joining the Mudcats. Next year he looks forward to once again being the TV broadcaster for East Carolina Pirates football and men’s basketball games on their local/regional networks, while calling NC State women’s basketball on radio, along with other games and sports on the ACC Network. In January, 2012, he’ll be calling the national radio broadcast of the East West Shrine Game from Tropicana Field.

Featured stories, The skinny, UNC

UNC’s Merletti wins ACC defensive back of the week honors

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UNC’s Matt Merletti, a senior from Cleveland, has earned Atlantic Coast Conference Defensive Back of the Week for his play against Virginia. Merletti made seven tackles and intercepted two passes in Carolina’s 28-17 win over the Cavaliers. Merletti’s two interceptions came on Virginia’s final two possessions to help the Tar Heels secure the victory.

Clemson sophomore quarterback Tajh Boyd and freshman wide receiver Sammy Watkins were two others of the seven players announced as the ACC Players of the Week. Boyd, the ACC quarterback of the week, tallied 416 yards of total offense, the fourth most in Clemson history in the Tigers’ 38-24 win over defending national champion Auburn. His teammate Watkins picked up honors for both the receiver and the rookie of the week for his performance in the game. Watkins caught 10 passes for 155 yards and two touchdowns.

Other winners are listed below.

OFFENSIVE LINEMAN – Omoregie Uzzi, Georgia Tech, OG, Jr., 6-3, 300, Lithonia, Ga.

Uzzi and the Yellow Jacket offensive line dominated the line of scrimmage in Georgia Tech’s 66-24 win over Kansas. The Jackets broke an NCAA record for yards per rushing attempt (12.1), broke an ACC record for rushing yards (604) and smashed a school record for total offense (768). Tech allowed only one sack on the day.

DEFENSIVE LINEMAN – Bjoern Werner, Florida State, DE, So., 6-4, 273, Berlin, Germany

Werner was a pivotal performer from his left end position as the Seminoles held the Sooners to 310 total yards; their lowest output since the 2009 season. A first-year starter, Werner posted a career-high six tackles (5 solos, 1 assist), which included two tackles for loss and a sack of OU quarterback Landry Jones. He was also credited with one quarterback hurry. Werner leads FSU with 3.5 tackles for loss and 2 sacks this season.

LINEBACKER – Luke Kuechly, Boston College, LB, Jr., 6-3, 237, Cincinnati, Ohio

Junior LB Luke Kuechly recorded 23 tackles in Boston College’s 20-19 loss to Duke, marking a career high and tying Stephen Boyd for second on the school’s all-time single-game list. Boyd recorded 23 tackles against Virginia Tech in 1993. The 23 tackles ties for fourth most tackles in a BC game (three players recorded 25). Saturday’s game marked the third game of Kuechly’s career with 20 or more tackles. The Cincinnati, Ohio native previously recorded 21 tackles at Duke (2010) and 20 tackles at NC State (2010). Kuechly now has 399 career tackles. He is positioned to become the fifth Eagle and 32nd player from the ACC to ever record 400 career tackles.

SPECIALIST – Dustin Hopkins, Florida State, K, Jr., 6-2, 190, Houston, Texas

Hopkins extended his streak of consecutive field goal conversions to 13, connecting from 53 and 46 yards against Oklahoma. Hopkins’ 53-yarder was the second-longest of his career. He also helped keep the Sooners bottled off by continuing his kickoff prowess. Hopkins kicked off four times and registered two touchbacks. Oklahoma’s longest return was 18 yards and they never began a series following a kickoff beyond its own 20-yard line. Hopkins is 6-of-6 on field goal attempts this season and has converted all 13 of his PAT attempts. In addition to his streak of 13 consecutive successful field goals, Hopkins has now converted 99 consecutive PATs and is just nine shy of tying the Florida State record held by Derek Schmidt since 1986.

Featured stories, The skinny

Kinston Indians morph into Carolina Mudcats after sad ending

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As the few fans remaining at the end of a twice rain-delayed playoff game were leaving, the only noise came from the Fredrick Keys’ players celebrating the Carolina League championship over the Kinston Indians. But then, after the Keys started leaving the field, and a handful of fans meandered down the breezeway, someone yelled out “Let’s go Mudcats.”

That’s as good a moment as any I suppose to usher in a new beginning after a rather sad ending in Kinston. Next season, the Kinston Indians will be the Carolina Mudcats as the Mudcats move from the Double A Southern League as a Reds organization to the Single A Carolina League as an Indians organization.

Kinston still hopes to get a minor league baseball team to play at historic Grainger Stadium, built in 1949, but considering that its the smallest pro baseball market and that fewer than 1,000 people showed up for the final game, it’s unlikely.

I attended the last pro game at Grainger Stadium and I saw my childhood of watching the Rocky Mount Leafs and the Rocky Mount Phillies flash before my eyes. The two stadiums were similar, the league was the same and the type of fans in attendance were similar – just regular eastern North Carolina folk out to watch what used to be called the national pasttime.

As I sat through a one hour and 10 minute rain delay before the game, I thought about something my uncle once said, “It’ll be a rainy day when they put me in the ground.” I held out hope that Kinston would win the game and finish the series championship the next day. But it was a rainy day when my uncle was buried and it was a rainy day when the Kinston Indians were buried.

The Indians actually led 2-0 after two innings but they should have gotten more. A late signal from Manager Aaron Holbert, coaching third, caused the runner to overrun third base and get picked off the bag to end the second inning. Holbert did have a great season as he was named manager of the year by Baseball America but that wasn’t a shining moment.

The third inning proved disastrous for Kinston as Fredrick got all the runs they would need and all the runs they would get. Fourteen Keys players came to bat in the inning and 11 of them scored as the Indians made three errors and the pitchers gave up three walks and six hits.

A few fans left at that point and many more left in the fourth inning when there was another rain delay – this one for 61 minutes.

The game was never in doubt as the Indians managed only one more run, that in the fifth.

The crowd was so thin by the end there was no final round of applause for the Kinston Indians – the last 25 years Kinston has played as the Indians but before that they also were a Carolina League team for another 25 plus years, most as the Eagles.

The Kinston players, obviously down, dragged themselves to the locker – one or two stopped to sign autographs but there wasn’t really much of a demand.

The Fredrick Keys, an Orioles affiliate, celebrated heartily, hoisting the Hope Mills Cup trophy, in a sort of surreal moment. Celebration would not seem to be the appropriate emotion as a Kinston franchise and a way of life in small-town America died.

Probably about 15 of the Kinston Indians will be Carolina Mudcats next year. Here’s hoping the beginning is better than this ending.

Duke, Featured stories, The skinny

Duke great to speak at Raleigh Sports Club

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Wes Chesson will be the guest speaker of the Raleigh Sports Club this Wednesday, Sept. 21.

One of the all-time great football players in Duke football history, lettering from 1968-70, and has been their football radio analyst for years and is a close observer of ACC Football. Hear him talk about arguably the most famous play in ACC history.

In addition, highly recruited Millbrook football player Keith Marshall will be honored as the Student Athlete of the Week. Marshall, a top academic performer, is a running back who is currently being recruited by many Division 1 NCAA football schools.

Forks Cafeteria will cater a Southern Buffet. The buffet line opens at 11:30 a.m. Meeting location will again be at Highland UMC at 1901 Ridge Road at the intersection of Lake Boone Trail, just inside the Beltline. Weekly attendance fee for members is $14 while others are $20 per person.

Featured stories, Panthers, Redskins, The skinny

The best and worst of Panthers loss and Redskins win

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Carolina Panthers’ QB Cam Newton looked good at first but he faltered and his team fell while Washington Redskins’ QB Rex Grossman looked bad at first but he led the Skins to a TD and field goal in the last five minutes as his team won.

Newton threw for more than 400 yards again but he threw three crucial interceptions in a 30-23 loss to Green Bay. Grossman threw interceptions on the Redskins first two possessions, including one inside the opponents’ five-yard-line, but came back with a touchdown strike to Santana Moss on fourth and three and led the team down the field in the last couple of minutes for a winning field goal as the Skins beat the Cardinals 22-21.

Dan Steinberg of the Washington Post gave his best and worst of the Redskins game while Joseph Person of the Raleigh News & Observer graded out the Panthers game.

Featured stories, Panthers, Redskins, The skinny

Predictions: Packers to pick apart Panthers while Skins handle Cardinals

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It’s kind of a shame that the Panthers couldn’t build on last week’s offensive explosion with an easier opponent this week. The Super Bowl champion Green Bay Packers come to town and are just too good for the Panthers, with or without Cam Newton. The Pack handles the Panthers 38-17.

Meanwhile the Redskins looked solid against the Giants last week and they face the Panthers’ Week 1 opponent in Arizona. The Skins are excited about their start to the season and they should be able to build on the momentum by a score of 27-16.

Last week, I started the season at 2-0 with a win by the Redskins and a loss by the Panthers.