Former NC State football coach Tom Reed, who spent 3 years leading Pack, dies at 77

Tom Reed, who died Monday at 77, didn’t win a lot of football games in his three seasons as head coach at N.C. State.

But Reed’s recruiting efforts helped set the stage for his coaching successor, Dick Sheridan, even if his brief tenure with NCSU was controversial at times given his fiery personality and outspoken nature.

Hired to replace Monte Kiffin as N.C. State coach after the 1982 season, Reed was brought in from Miami of Ohio, where he was 34-19-2 in five seasons. He also had played at Miami for Bo Schembechler and was considered a strict disciplinarian as a coach.

Reed had 3-8 records in each of his three seasons with the Pack, but recruited such standouts as quarterback Erik Kramer and wide receiver Haywood Jeffires, who both went on to play in the NFL.

Sheridan, in his first season with the Pack, had a 8-3-1 record in 1986 as Kramer was named the ACC player of the year. Jeffires was a first-round NFL draft pick and was named first-team All-Pro in 1991.

Reed was mercurial, blunt and unpredictable. He could flash a smile one moment, show a flash of anger a few moments later, then quickly revert to calmly talking X’s and O’s.

Reed clashed at times with the late Bruce Poulton, then NCSU chancellor. There were disagreements over the athletic eligibility of some freshmen just before the 1985 opener against East Carolina, The N&O reported. Poulton would later say there was not enough progress being made in the football program.

Reed resigned in December 1985 with two years remaining on his five-year contract, accepting a financial settlement.

Reed joined Schembechler’s staff at Michigan as defensive line coach, calling his three seasons at N.C. State a “difficult period” in a 1986 interview with the N&O.