Nov. 25, 2009
by Lee Pace
Life is good today for Errol Hood and David Bomar, the former recently coaching his two sons to the league championship in their 5-6 year old flag football division, the latter welcoming the arrival of son Jack McCauley Bomar into the world less than a week ago. But one decade ago they were just kids playing football, Hood aspiring to be the next Dre' Bly or Robert Williams and Bomar happy to be sporting the same powder blue jersey his dad had worn three decades earlier.
The Scene: Thursday night in Ericsson Stadium in Charlotte two weeks before Thanksgiving, 1999, just over 41,000 fans in the house and ESPN's cameras beaming the sights and sounds to a national audience. This was the second game of a two-year experiment of taking the Carolina-State series to a neutral site, Carolina winning in overtime the Saturday after Thanksgiving in '98 in front of a full house on Na Brown's TD catch in overtime. The Charlotte fling served as Carolina fulfilling its commitment in place at the time for all ACC schools to host a made-for-TV weeknight game, this long before UNC's administration figured out a way to host a Thursday night game in Kenan Stadium as it did over fall break in 2009.
The Stakes: The continued employment of head coaches Carl Torbush of the Tar Heels and Mike O'Cain of the Wolfpack. Carolina was reeling at 1-8 in Torbush's second year in the stead of Mack Brown, and a 28-3 annihilation at the hands of Division 1-AA foe Furman two weeks earlier had rocked the foundation of a program that only two years earlier was perched in the nation's Top 10. O'Cain, meanwhile, was in his seventh year skippering the Wolfpack ship, and State's 6-4 mark so far in 1999 represented everything State fans had come to love about the era (good enough to open the year with a shocking victory at Texas) and loathe about it as well (bad enough to get pounded by 24 points by Wake Forest, pre-Jim Grobe). Worse, O'Cain was 0-6 against the Tar Heels.
"This is a bottom line business, and the bottom line is winning," O'Cain would later say. "You can put all the lip service on it you want, but the bottom line is winning--and beating the right people."
The Supporting Cast: The Tar Heels had Domonique Williams at quarterback, his conversion from tailback coming after an Achilles tendon injury to Ronald Curry, a torn rotator cuff to Luke Huard and mononucleosis for Antwon Black, himself an emergency switch from safety. They had two future first-round NFL draft picks in the defensive line in Julius Peppers and Ryan Sims, but both were young and raw in their sophomore seasons. The Wolfpack, meanwhile, was led by fourth-year starter Jamie Barnette at quarterback, a pair of quality receivers, Chris Coleman and Koren Robinson, and two future pros in the secondary, Brian Williams and Adrian Wilson.
"We felt like were playing for Coach," says Hood, who lives today in Rockingham and works in Fuquay-Varina. "Obviously, we had not had a great season because of the injuries and lot of the things that occurred. It was a wild time. But we knew that no matter what happened, we were playing State, no matter where we were playing, we were playing N.C. State and we owned the series. We were pretty confident that no matter who we put at quarterback, when we stepped on the field, we were going to find a way to win and that it was something that was supposed to happen."
The Prelude: The Tar Heels on their first possession cobbled together their first scoring drive in three games (you read that correctly, they had not crossed the goal since the fourth quarter of a 45-7 hammering at Maryland three weeks before, and that was certainly after the Terps stopped paying attention). On the Tar Heels' third play, Williams faked a handoff to Daniel Davis to the left, spun and rolled to the right with the option of keeping or throwing. He feigned the running play long enough to draw the Wolfpack secondary, then heaved the ball downfield to Kory Bailey for a 45-yard gain. That set up a touchdown and a 7-0 lead, and the Heels later added a field goal (staked by punter Brian Schmitz's fake and throw to DeFonte Coleman).
State moved the ball well between the 20s, with Barnette hitting Coleman on nine passes for 108 yards, many of them shallow crossing routes, but the Wolfpack could never punch the ball across the goal and settled for two field goals. Trailing 10-6, State got the ball at its nine with 8:10 to play and launched a time-consuming march that took it to the Carolina one. A risky pitch to fullback Carlos Doggett on third down was fumbled, and the Wolfpack was backed up to the nine. Peppers jumped offside on the original fourth down, moving the ball to the four with just over 1:30 to play and giving State a second fourth down.
The Headliners: The vaunted Carolina defense of 1997 (average per game allowed of 209 yards and 13 points) had turned over nearly a hundred percent in two seasons, and the only true remnant of that squad was linebacker Brandon Spoon, who watched from the sidelines in '99 after tearing a biceps tendon the second game of the year. Sims and Peppers were just learning to play, and no one had yet heard of David Thornton. Two players trying to find a fit were Hood, a sophomore cornerback from Lenior, and Bomar, a junior safety from Durham.
Hood started all 11 games at the cornerback spot so well occupied for three years by Bly. He lacked the blazing speed of Williams, who left after the 1997 season, and the remarkable innate instincts of Bly, who's still making a living in the NFL, but he was nonetheless a solid player and staked his claim with an outstanding game earlier in the year at Georgia Tech--seven tackles, a sack, three break-ups, two fumble recoveries and an interception. Hood would start every game for three years and eventually play for the Montreal Alouettes of the Canadian Football League.
Bomar and brother J.P. grew up in Durham as avid Tar Heel fans, their father Gayle a quarterback in the 1960s at the tail end of the Jim Hickey era and beginning of the Bill Dooley regime. David was recruited by Davidson and Catawba (but not offered a scholarship), applied only to UNC and walked-on in 1997 as a holder and special teams player. His role grew over time, and he scored a touchdown on a blocked punt in the 1998 Las Vegas Bowl. Bomar was awarded a scholarship prior to the 1999 season, and his knack of leveling the migraine hit on a ball carrier as well as an injury to starting safety Quinton Savage opened the door for Bomar to start the last four games of the year.
"It was a surprise for me just to make the team," says Bomar. "Then I was a meat-and-potatoes special teams guy and ended up starting four games that year. It was a dream come true for me."
The Play: The Wolfpack lined twin receivers to the right on fourth down, with Coleman as the slot receiver coming in motion to the left. Hood had Coleman man-to-man, and the Wolfpack had some success earlier in "rubbing off" the Tar Heel defenders in man coverage underneath the secondary. Hood sensed what was coming as he saw the motion from Coleman.
"That play had been a problem for us," Hood says. "It was the perfect play call for them. But I knew there were only a certain number of plays they could run from that formation with that motion. I figured they were coming back underneath."
Though Torbush served as defensive coordinator and called signals in previous games that season and in 1998, that week his game-planning time had been restricted by having to spend time meeting with Athletic Director Dick Baddour and other university officials over the state of the program and his very job. So defensive line coach Kenny Browning and secondary coach Ron Case organized the defensive game plan, and Browning called signals in Charlotte. He anticipated the shallow crossing route and ordered Sims, a 6-4, 285-pound mini-mountain, to drop into zone pass coverage just beyond the line of scrimmage.
"We wanted Ryan to disrupt Coleman, throw his timing off a little and not get a clean break," Browning says. "We didn't want him to run scot free across there. If you're in man coverage that close to the goal, you've got to expect crossing routes because they don't have room to run deep. They're trying to rub us off, but we're sitting a big guy in the middle to impede them some."
Tim Burgess was the Carolina linebacker on the side Coleman was running toward pre-snap. As Hood passed Burgess while trailing Coleman, he tried to alert Burgess to what was coming. He knew Burgess could be in perfect position to intercept or at least deflect the pass. But Burgess didn't hear him and instead pursued the defensive call from Browning. Burgess blitzed and wound up in Barnette's face as the quarterback launched the ball across the middle to Coleman.
Coleman caught the pass in the middle of the field just inside the goal line. Hood was trailing him and immediately grabbed his jersey and shoulder pads and pulled him down from behind. Coleman's knees hit the ground just inside the one and he tried to extend the ball across the goal, but Bomar had seen the play develop and quickly arrived to pound Coleman and insure the fourth down threat was terminated.
"I actually tried to swipe the ball and break it up," Hood says. "When he caught it, I just thought, `Oh my God.' I grabbed his jersey and held on for dear life. He fell to his knees and that's when Bomar hit him."
Bomar's job on most coverages throughout the game was to first check the tight end. If he came out in a pass route, Bomar covered him. If not, Bomar was free to go where needed.
"That was one of the best games I ever played because I had the tight end and he wound up blocking down a lot," says Bomar, who had nine unassisted tackles and three assists. "That freed me up to be a robber and hang out in pass coverage or come up on the run. I was in on a whole lot of run plays, so it was fun for me."
This photograph taken by Chuck Liddy of the News & Observer ran the next morning and showed a perfect view of the play--Hood pulling Coleman down from the rear, Bomar leveling his face into Coleman's midsection from the other side. Hood, Bomar and Case all have versions of the photo hanging in their homes, and an oversized rendition has been displayed in a hallway of the Kenan Football Center along with dozens of other big plays.
"Errol had a good enough grasp on him that he probably would not have scored, but you can't know that for sure," Torbush said. "I'm glad David was there to finish him off."
"Six inches short," O'Cain lamented. "Six inches short all night."
The Aftermath: The win bought Torbush some time, and when the Tar Heels pummeled Duke 38-0 the following week, he kept his job. The Wolfpack finished with a loss at East Carolina to end the year 6-6 and O'Cain was dismissed.
"That play was a job-saver," Case says today. "I'll testify to that. We got a little lucky on that one--the State receiver should have been in the end zone when he caught it. Thank goodness he was six inches short. Hood made a great play on him and then Bomar cleaned it up. Once we beat State, we felt we had a chance to keep our jobs. Then we beat the snot out of Duke and stayed for another year."
Torbush and O'Cain had been friends since recruiting Division I-AA circles in the early 1980s, their jobs coaching at arch-rivals notwithstanding, and four days before Christmas, Torbush hired O'Cain to become the Tar Heels' offensive coordinator for the 2000 season. A day later, offensive line coach Robbie Caldwell moved with O'Cain.
"If you can't beat 'em, join 'em," O'Cain said with a smile.
"It does seem kind of strange," Caldwell admitted. "I have a closet full of red clothes I have to do something with."
The Tar Heels went 6-5 in 2000 and Torbush was then fired; he has since coached at Alabama, Texas A&M and Carson-Newman and now is defensive coordinator at Mississippi State. O'Cain first relocated to Clemson and now is quarterbacks coach at Virginia Tech. Case moved with Torbush to Alabama for a year and then retired, Browning remains on the current Tar Heel staff as running backs coach. Bomar followed his dad into the financial services industry and works in the Chapel Hill office of Morgan Stanley Smith Barney. Hood works as program director for therapeutic facilities in Fuquay-Varina and comes to Chapel Hill twice a week to coach youth league football.
Six inches this way and one set of dominoes tumble, six inches another way and the circumstances are entirely different.
"One play determined the fate of a lot of people," Hood says.
"It was crazy," Bomar adds. "We were just scraping people together to field a lineup. We were patchwork. It was a grind, but we never gave up and we believed in each other."
Lee Pace has provided a colorful and insightful look into the world of Tar Heel football since Extra Points began in 1990. Send him and the broadcast crew of the Tar Heel Sports Network your questions for the weekly pre-game show at asktheheels@gmail.com.
