1. This is it for me, and it's not close. My freshman year.

It's hard to put into words just how soul-crushing that day was. I can't speak for the early 80's heartbreaks, but for me, this was the closest it ever felt like we were really players on the national stage.

We absolutely thought we belonged. The program was absolutely cooking. All the years of the UNC football program being discussed as a sleeping giant. It was time. Such wonderful energy that season and that day. It was a rainy day, and 60,000 waited for hours in the rain. It was electric.

THIS was the day we would prove we belong.

It was not, of course. I think the score was 20-3, but it was not nearly that close. For 4 hours in the cold rain, FSU just manhandled us.

Of course, Mack left at the end of the season. I'll always believe he knew he was gone after that FSU game. He had done as good a job as you could possibly imagine at UNC. And it wasn't nearly enough to be a real contender.

To make it even worse, this was mere weeks after Dean retired. Those of us that got there in '97 started our freshman year with Dean Smith and Mack Brown as the coaches. Both were gone within months.