CHAPEL HILL – There isn’t anything much like ringing a large bell for some youthful hijinks when when clad in Carolina blue and trying to move on from an abysmal performance on the football field.
Perhaps that is why Duke’s placement on North Carolina’s schedule this season couldn’t have been more apropos.
Saturday, the 3-1 Blue Devils will make the short drive down 15-501 to Kenan Stadium, and when they run out of the tunnel, the Victory Bell won’t accompany them. Instead, it will join the Tar Heels, pulled by a couple of cheerleaders, ridden by a couple more, ringing that bell like it’s a blood-right mission.
UNC is coming off a performance that has squarely placed its season at a crossroads. A preseason top-10 team, the Tar Heels are suddenly 2-2 overall and 1-2 in the ACC. They haven’t come close to playing a complete game yet. But plenty of football remains, they were quick to point out this week, and perhaps a visit from their rivals down the road and playing for something as historic as the Victory Bell can galvanize Mack Brown’s squad into the unit many expected to see from the outset.
"Everyone wants that Victory Bell," Brown said. "It's important to me. It's important to our players. It's important to our university and our fanbase, regardless of the records."
Carolina and Duke have been playing football since 1888, but the Victory Bell didn’t come into the picture until 1948. That is when a couple of cheerleaders from each school came up with the idea of playing for something tangible.
Norman Spear, the head cheerleader at UNC at the time, along with Loring Jones of Duke, saw how so many other heated football rivalry games meant more than just winning or losing because programs played for something. A trophy of sorts.
Minnesota and Wisconsin play for Paul Bunyan’s Axe, Purdue and Indiana battle for the Old Oaken Bucket, Ole Miss and Mississippi State play for the Golden Egg, and Army and Navy battle annually for the Commander-in-Chief’s Trophy, just to name a few.
And for 73 years, the Tar Heels and Blue Devils have fought, scratched, clawed, and bled for the Victory Bell.
Having beaten Duke the last two seasons, the bell is housed in the friendly confines of the Kenan Football Center, home to UNC’s program. It serves as a regular reminder but also fuel, especially the week of this annual clash.
“We have a place for it in our facility, so we walk by it, we see it every single day,” UNC quarterback Sam Howell said. “It obviously means a lot to our program, to our school, to our fans. And beating Duke is something that’s real important to our team, and it’s definitely an awesome celebration in the locker room after the game when you have that bell.”
The celebration continues year-round, sort of, though a heightened spirit has resurfaced again this week. What’s the point in playing for a bell if you aren’t gonna ring it? So, the Heels ring it. A lot.
“Oh yeah, all the time,” senior outside linebacker Tomon Fox said. “It’s definitely been out on the field during practice this week.”
Fifth-ranked UNC won the first Victory Bell game, 20-0, in 1948, a contest played among the pines at Kenan Stadium. Overall, UNC has claimed the bell, panting it Carolina blue in the process, 47 times to 25 victories for the Blue Devils. The Tar Heels have won two straight in the series, with their longest winning streak 13 games from 1990-2002.
That stretch included the final eight seasons of Brown’s first stint as Carolina’s coach, though he lost to the Devils in his first two tries. That included the memorable 41-0 drubbing at home, which promoted then-Duke Coach Steve Spurrier to have his club take a team photo underneath the scoreboard.
“I still don’t like that picture; I probably should pull it back out,” Brown said following practice Wednesday morning. “But it’s really about the game and was worse that we got beat 41-0 on our field. And that’s the last time they’ve beaten us.”
By “us" Brown is talking about his staffs going up against Duke. He beat the Devils the last eight times he faced them during his first stint and is 2-0 since returning.
But about that photo. Does it stick in his craw? What about Spurrier, any light-hearted chats about that when their paths have crossed in the three decades since?
“I always thank Steve for taking the picture and putting it out there so I could use it and see it,” Brown said, before telling a story from years back.
“Steve and I were eating dinner – and Jerri his wife’s a sweetheart and she and Sally are good friends – and Jerry looked at me and said, ‘I know one day you’re gonna love playing against Steve and beating him as bad as you can and take a picture afterwards.’ And I simply said, ‘Yes.’”
That never happened because the two never met on the field again. But he has faced the Blue Devils, twice since returning to Chapel Hill. Brown is 10-0 versus Duke since the photo, including a thrilling 20-17 triumph in Kenan Stadium two years ago, and a 56-24 rout at Wallace Wade Stadium last November.
He and the Tar Heels can add to the streak when the Devils visit Kenan for a noon kickoff Saturday. Given their most recent performance, a 45-22 thumping at Georgia Tech, ringing the bell this weekend is the goal, the mission, and the mantra.
