For years now, NC State fans (and administrators) have complained about the imbalance of the ACC’s divisions in football. There is evidence to prove that the Coastal is easier to breakthrough than the Atlantic, which is NC State’s division. There have been five different programs in the past five years to represent the Coastal in the ACC title game, and all five lost the championship contest to either Florida State or Clemson in the Atlantic. That included Duke and UNC, NC State’s Tobacco Road rivals, having everything come together to have their own versions of a dream season.
Meanwhile, FSU and Clemson have either won national titles or represented the ACC in the College Football Playoffs all five of those years. And for a few years Louisville had arguably the best quarterback in college football in the electrifying Lamar Jackson, who won a Heisman Trophy as a sophomore.
But Jackson is gone, and this year is proof of how much he carried Louisville the past two seasons. Florida State is also far from its days as a national title contender, enduring what could be a second straight .500-type season. And the breaks are starting to come NC State’s way.
The Pack’s crossover opponents in the Coastal — Virginia and UNC — are not the division’s heavyweights. Its biggest rival to emerge as the chief challenger for Clemson in the Atlantic was Boston College, but the Eagles had to play NC State without its star running back in A.J. Dillon, and the Pack held on for a 28-23 win.
Looking forward
With a likely NFL quarterback in his senior season, the deepest receiving corps that the Pack may have ever assembled, an offensive line that was recently rated eighth best in the country by Pro Football Focus and an emerging running game thanks to a healthy freshman Ricky Person, the Pack has the offensive attack to keep it in any games.
The offense has also been good at being methodical enough to allow NC State to be 13th nationally and best in the ACC in time of possession. This is partially due to a third down conversion rate that is tops in the country. A byproduct of that is the defense, reloading after heavy losses, is not forced to defend much, risking exposure and growing pains and instead playing at a better-than-expected level.
Not everything is perfect for NC State. It has two back-to-back weekend road trips after the bye. For some perspective, division king Clemson has not had to do it once in the past three seasons. The only other ACC team that has to play a pair of back-to-back ACC road games this year is Miami, but it at least has a bye week in between one of them.
And the next two games are on the road against arguably the best two teams in the Atlantic alongside NC State and BC — surprising Syracuse and national title contender Clemson. The latter remains the biggest hurdle. The Tigers show no signs of giving up its stranglehold on the ACC’s Atlantic Division any time soon. Especially with a looking star at quarterback in freshman Trevor Lawrence just getting started.
Thus it would be fair to say this might be NC State’s best chance for the foreseeable future to win that elusive Atlantic Division. Of course, it’s also the second straight year where one wonders if they would be the best team in the Coastal had it been on that side of the alignment.
Read more: Two redshirt freshmen depart NC State football program