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NC State football countdown to kickoff: 92

MattCarterby: Matt Carter05/31/23TheWolfpacker
Terry Jordan (1)
Quarterback Terry Jordan, shown with head coach Dick Sheridan. (Photo from NC State)

The NC State football season opener for 2023 is at Connecticut on Aug. 31 — or 92 days away. TheWolfpacker.com’s countdown for the season looks at the significance of the number 92 in Pack history.

NC State Football And No. 92

The 1992 season was full of highlights for a NC State football team that spent every week of the year ranked in the Top 25 after opening with a 24-14 win over No. 15 Iowa on a neutral field. The Pack reached as high as No. 12 following a 9-2-1 regular season before finishing at No. 17 following a loss to Florida in the Gator Bowl.

That was the end of one of the greatest coaching tenures in program history, as Dick Sheridan resigned following the season. Sheridan, who once turned down the head coaching job at Georgia to remain at NC State, finished with a 52-29-3 overall record over seven years, including 31-18-1 in the ACC. In each of his last two campaigns, the Pack won nine games in the regular season and finished ranked.

In 2021, Sheridan was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame.

One of the best passing performances in NC State football history came in 1992. Terry Jordan completed 23 of 25 attempts against archrival North Carolina for 361 yards to help lead the Wolfpack to a 27-20 win over the Tar Heels. That still ranks as the highest completion percentage (.920) in a game among qualified passers in the program’s annals.

At the time, Jordan became just the fifth quarterback at NC State to throw for 300 or more yards in a game.

That victory also capped Sheridan’s coaching career in Raleigh against UNC with a 6-1 record, including defeating Mack Brown five in a row to start Brown’s first tenure with the Heels.

And yet 1992 also saw one of the best running performances by a NC State football player. Anthony Barbour finished the year with 1,204 yards on the ground, the best in program history for a single year by a runner not named Ted Brown and third most productive overall. The highlight of the season for Barbour was rushing for 189 yards on 25 carries against Texas Tech, which is tied for the 12th most yards in a single game by a Wolfpacker.

Strangely, that was the only time Barbour went over 100 yards that season.

On defense, no NC State player has had more tackles since David Merritt accumulated 167 in 1992, and Carl Reeves, who was a sophomore at the time, became just the second player in program history to record double-digit sacks in a year with 10.5. Reeves topped the 10 that Mike Jones had two years prior to briefly set a school record that was broken by Tyler Lawrence a year later.

Reeves also became the first NC State player to have at least 20 tackles for loss (TFL) in a season (had 20). His sack and TFL totals still are the most all-time by a Wolfpack sophomore in program history.

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