Oct. 7, 2009

The Jim Hickey era of Tar Heel football in the early 1960s was marked by its 1963 ACC championship and its proclivity to slay some dragons on the national football landscape. Over the eight years of the Hickey regime from 1959-66, Carolina beat Notre Dame, Tennessee, Georgia and Michigan State within the hospitable bosom of Kenan Stadium, then ventured on the road to win at Ohio State and Michigan.

Call them "The Giant Killers."

"Those games were sure a lot of fun," says Danny Talbott, a Tar Heel quarterback from 1964-66. "It was very exciting to beat those teams, particularly when we struggled against some teams in the ACC. We just seemed to rise to the occasion for those games. It's a great thrill to think back on going to a place like Michigan and turning a crowd of 88,000 into total silence."

Talbott is shown running the ball in this photo from the Tar Heels' 1965 Georgia game in Chapel Hill, a 47-35 loss in late October. It wasn't unusual during that era to see the oval "G" from the University of Georgia, the distinctive Michigan Wolverine helmet decal, or the block "T" from Tennessee in Kenan Stadium as athletic director Chuck Erickson was fond of scheduling what he called "PC Games"--for Prestige and Currency. Kenan Stadium's capacity at the time was roughly half what it was in places like Ann Arbor (88,000 capacity) or Columbus (80,000), so the Tar Heels received a hefty pay day for traveling to the hotbeds of the Big Ten region.

Bud Carson was an assistant coach on Hickey's staff from 1959-64 before leaving to become defensive coordinator (and later head coach) at Georgia Tech and then molding the "Steel Curtain" defense of the 1970s era Pittsburgh Steelers. He remembered that two of the wins, over Notre Dame in 1960 and Tennessee in 1961, provided a foundation to the program that would win the 1963 ACC title and whip Air Force in the Gator Bowl. The Tar Heels clipped Notre Dame 12-7 at home in 1960 as the defense intercepted five Darryl Lamonica passes, and the following year they nudged Tennessee in 22-21 in Kenan Stadium when Ray Farris hit Ward Marslender with a 28-yard last-minute TD pass.

"We were struggling to find ourselves in those days," Carson said in 2002, three years before succumbing to emphysema. "We were just an average football team, trying to get over the hump. Those games gave our players some confidence they'd lacked. It was difficult building a program at that time. The General College seemed to be flunking out half of the football team every time you turned around. Academically, it was very tough at Carolina. We didn't have the tutoring staffs and counseling support they have today.

"Those wins were the building blocks. We had the great year in '63, then for whatever reason couldn't sustain it."

Carolina had little trouble dispatching Georgia 28-7 at home in 1963 and the following year held off a late Michigan State rally to notch a 21-15 triumph in Kenan Stadium. Those victories set up Midwestern road trips the following two seasons and the Tar Heels built on their giant-killing reputation.

Carolina staged one of its best defensive performances ever in 1965 as it stopped Ohio State on the Tar Heels' side of midfield six times--at the nine, 14, 15, 27, 29 and 41 yard-lines. Talbott scored on a short run on Carolina's first possession, and halfback Max Chapman squirted one 48 yards at the end of the game to account for the Tar Heels' scoring in a 14-3 win. "I got more of a kick out of this one than beating Michigan State last year," Hickey said. Problem was, the Tar Heels returned home to Chapel Hill and promptly lost to Virginia, 21-17, during a season in which the Cavaliers would finish 4-6--the same record as the Tar Heels.

Michigan was ranked seventh nationally in 1966 when the Tar Heels ventured into Ann Arbor the third week of the season and stunned the maize-and-blue masses with a 21-7 shocker as they converted fumble recoveries at the Wolverine 14 and 24 yard-lines. Carolina's defense again was stout, holding Michigan to three yards rushing in the second half. The magnitude of the victories over the years just kept rising in Hickey's view: "This is the best win I've had, bar none," he said.

And it was his last win as well.

Despite these major triumphs, Hickey could manage no more than a 36-45 record and one bowl appearance during his eight years as Carolina's head coach. For every win over Tennessee or Michigan, there were losses to Wake Forest (four of them in seven years), Duke (also four in seven years) and even two to Virginia, a lowly doormat at the time. After the win at Michigan, the Tar Heels had a week off, then traveled to Notre Dame, where they were pounded 32-0 by the Irish as Talbott and second-team QB Jeff Beaver were both knocked out of the game, Beaver leaving when Alan Page separated his shoulder on a sack. The Heels lost seven straight to end the 1966 season and Hickey resigned and moved to the University of Connecticut to become athletic director.

"It's an interesting question--why did we play those big-name teams so well and then not beat others in the ACC?" muses Talbott. "I know it wasn't because coach Hickey put any more emphasis on those games. He did not. He felt every game was of equal importance. We just seemed to find a little something extra for those games. And I think there was probably a lack of respect issue there as well from our opponents--they didn't know what they were getting into.

"I can remember Woody Hayes saying the week we played up there that he couldn't understand why they would be scheduling some team from `Tobacco Road' in North Carolina. That put a fire in my belly, I guarantee you that. That made that win extra sweet."

Talbott was mentioned as a Heisman Trophy candidate entering the 1966 season, but he suffered a badly sprained ankle at Notre Dame and was never full speed the rest of his senior year.

"If Danny had had a supporting cast, there's no telling what he'd have done," says Marion Barnes, a Tar Heel letterman in 1966 and fellow product of Rocky Mount Senior High. "He could have won the Heisman Trophy. He could play in the big-time. But he was always hurt. He never had any protection. He had a lack of support on both sides of the ball. We might have had one or two good players, but not enough of them."

Prestige and currency are still important in the Tar Heels' modern scheduling philosophy. They have recently completed a home-and-home with Notre Dame and have played one leg of a deal with South Carolina. Carolina plays Tennessee in 2011 and 2012. And Carolina is deep into talks with a couple of high-profile schools for games in the next decade.

Another prestige game will come next year when the Tar Heels open the 2010 season against LSU in the Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game. The game will be played Sept. 4 in Atlanta's Georgia Dome in the third rendition of what organizers promote as a matchup of "top-tier programs in a BCS-type game on the first Saturday of every season." The set-up is similar to Carolina traveling to Los Angeles in 1993 to meet Southern Cal in the Disneyland Pigskin Classic, a resounding 31-9 Carolina win. The Tar Heels were opening their sixth year of coach Mack Brown's program then and will be entering Butch Davis's fourth season in 2010.

"I really feel like we're on schedule," UNC Athletic Director Dick Baddour said. "I think we're ready to play that kind of game. Our program, a few years ago, had some success with that kind of highlight and it was beneficial for us, and so maybe we can duplicate that."

But the financial emphasis is no longer on taking road trips to large venues in other parts of the nation; it's on having at least seven home games a year. To have the balance in their favor, the Tar Heels schedule some teams--like this week's opponent, Georgia Southern--that will come to Chapel Hill without requiring a return game to their home venue.

Following are the Tar Heels' opponents on future schedules as they stand today:

2010--LSU in Atlanta to open the season on Sept. 4; William & Mary and East Carolina at home; Rutgers away. Cross-divisional ACC games feature Clemson's first return to Kenan Stadium since 2002 and Carolina's first trip to Florida State since 2004.

2011--James Madison, Rutgers and Tennessee at home; at East Carolina. Cross-divisional ACC games are at Clemson and Wake Forest at home.

2012--at Tennessee; cross-divisional games are Maryland at home and at Wake Forest.

2013--at South Carolina on a Thursday night to open the season; Minnesota at home. Cross-divisional games are Boston College in Chapel Hill and at Maryland.

2014--at Minnesota; Cross-divisional games are Florida State at home and Boston College on the road.

Lee Pace has been writing "Extra Points" for 20 years now and this year's installments can be found on TarHeelBlue.com on Mondays and Thursdays. He and the broadcast crew for the Tar Heel Sports Network answer reader email on the pre-game show, so send your questions to asktheheels@gmail.com.