If that really was Drake Maye’s last game in Chapel Hill, it provided a fitting full-circle ending

Here was Drake Maye in the middle of it all late Saturday night, in the middle of the kind of moment that he had to have imagined countless times as a kid, coming to Kenan Stadium with his brothers and his mom and dad, Mark, who set all of this in motion 40 years ago.

Here was Drake Maye in the middle of the mob, somewhere, after North Carolina’s 47-45 double-overtime victory against Duke. With people swarming him. With his classmates celebrating with him. With the eventual chant, after Maye finally found himself doing a postgame interview on the ACC Network, of “one more year! ... one more year!”

Loud enough for Maye to hear it. Loud enough for everyone to hear it.

Imagine what it must’ve felt it like for Maye, who spent many a Saturday inside Kenan Stadium with his family, who grew up wearing UNC gear and rooting on the Tar Heels, first fantasizing about one day playing for them and then, as it became more and more of a reality, planning for the moment. And then here he was late Saturday night, “just soaking that in,” he said of the scene.

“Fairy tale” is the phrase Maye used, a couple of times, to describe it, and indeed this was something out of a children’s storybook, especially for someone who grew up in the Maye home — especially, as he said, for “a North Carolina kid who grew up going to Kenan, grew up as a fan.”

“It’s a fairy tale ending,” he said a little later Saturday night, well past midnight now and early into Sunday morning. “I’m glad it ended this way. I would’ve been heartbroken if not, if it went the other way. And like I said — no better way, against a rival, with the fans storming the field, senior night.

“Just, a lot of emotions ... It’s a dream come true for me, right here.”

There were a couple of layers to the catharsis.

For one, as that “one more year” chant underscored, this is very likely Maye’s final college season. And if it is, that was his final home game, one in which he passed for 342 yards and one touchdown, ran for two more and made the winning plays, late, after the Tar Heels defense faltered in the fourth quarter (now there’s a familiar set of circumstances).

Maye has been fantastic, again, in his second season as UNC’s starting quarterback, though some of his numbers (like passing touchdowns, for instance) aren’t quite as eye-popping as they were a season ago. The Tar Heels’ unexpected defeats against Virginia and Georgia Tech pushed UNC out of the national college football conversation, and likely doomed Maye’s Heisman Trophy chances.

The losses didn’t, though, do any damage to Maye’s professional prospects. If anything, his NFL Draft stock has only continued to rise — so much so that, now, he’s among the favorites to be the top overall selection in the 2024 draft. As much as Maye loves UNC, it’d be stunning – and, one could argue, unwise – to return to school and turn down what awaits him next spring.

And so that was one reason for the emotion Saturday night – the realization that this was probably, almost assuredly, the last time he’ll walk onto that field as UNC’s quarterback. But then there was a deeper part of it, too. Maye alluded to it when he referenced his upbringing, the Saturdays he’d spent in Kenan Stadium, growing up a UNC fan.

And growing up a fan because of what his dad started all those years ago.

Mark Maye, of Charlotte’s Independence High, was perhaps the nation’s best quarterback prospect when he committed to UNC in 1983. He seemed destined for great things, in all the ways. But then a shoulder injury derailed his football prospects. He could barely throw in his first season as a starter, in 1984. Major off-season surgery forced him to miss the entire 1985 season, and he couldn’t throw a football at all for a year.

When he returned, at last, that right arm that’d portended such big things was never quite the same. Mark’s final college game, in November 1987, came against Duke. Another injury forced him out in the third quarter, and as he stood on the sideline and watched the end of the Tar Heels’ 25-10 defeat, he pleaded with UNC coach Dick Crum to let him back in, to no avail.

“Glory and pain,” Ron Green wrote that day in the Charlotte Observer, of Maye’s college years.

“I wanted to help,” Mark Maye told reporters later, of his desire to go back into his final college game, even when injured.

He tried to keep his football dream alive for as long as he could, later playing for the last time with the Raleigh-Durham Skyhawks of the World League of American Football. But then, another injury, and never played again. Mark and his wife, Aimee, turned their focus toward their shared future. They started a family. The oldest of their four boys, Luke, became a UNC basketball player who grew up to make one of the greatest shots in school history.

Their youngest, Drake, became the Tar Heels quarterback, just like his father. If that really was his final college home game Saturday night, it came against the same rival school that Mark faced in his last college game. The ending, for Mark, was one filled with anguish and pain, and a longing to go back in even after he couldn’t; a longing to help.

For Drake, it was an ending of jubilation. A family story had come full circle. A childhood dream had become real.

ONE BIG THING

It was a rare college football Saturday, indeed, in these parts, one a little reminiscent of the old Dixie Classic days in basketball, or the Big Four Tournament in Greensboro, of the 1970s and early-80s. Those events (which should be brought back, in some form) always came with a rare kind of anticipation, and helped cement North Carolina as the nation’s preeminent college basketball state.

And so how about this, on Saturday, with something of a football version? In Winston-Salem, there was N.C. State and Wake Forest getting together in the latest installment of one of the nation’s oldest continuing rivalries. And, in Chapel Hill, Duke and North Carolina came together to produce a double-overtime classic. Well, at least one of the games produced something memorable.

Free idea: As long as the ACC stays together — which, who knows — it should work to make a Big Four Saturday a regular thing. One Saturday per season, and preferably the same Saturday, every fall, featuring two games with North Carolina’s four ACC schools. How ‘bout it?

REALIGNMENT RUMBLINGS

OK, hear me out: The big college football news that began to trickle out early Sunday morning, only to be confirmed not long after by every national college football reporter in the country, underscores what all this major-conference realignment is really about: schools need more and more money to hire very expensive coaches – and then need even more money to fire them, when things don’t work out.

Texas A&M is a rare case study, in that it’s rich enough to fire Jimbo Fisher regardless of the Aggies’ conference affiliation. A&M could go independent and come up with the cash (thanks, oil money). But being in the SEC certainly doesn’t hurt. Let it sink in that A&M made Jimbo Fisher the highest-paid coach in the country at the time of his hiring, and that now the university will pay him more than $70 million just to go away.

Fisher will now go from the pressure-cooker of the SEC (and football in Texas, at large) to the best work (or, non-work, as it were) anyone can ever get: being a fired college football coach, and collecting huge checks to do nothing. What a life. What an industry.

THREE TO LIKE

1. Drake Maye’s perfect ending. Another reason for Maye to leave school and pursue what awaits him at the next level: it’d be difficult to top the kind of finish he experienced Saturday night. Amid all the not-great stuff happening in college sports, and there’s a lot of it, stories like that — homegrown quarterback and lifelong fan of the school leads team to dramatic victory over fierce rival, then revels in the spectacle of it all — is the best of what college sports can still be.

2. Brennan Armstrong has his moment. After losing his starting position following an ugly defeat against Louisville in late September, Armstrong, who arrived at N.C. State with a lot of hope and expectations, wasn’t in the best of places. But he didn’t complain. He didn’t quit. He accepted a reduced role and still did what he could in practices and from the sideline. And then his time came, again, Saturday at Wake Forest. And he delivered.

3. The M.J. Morris situation (to be continued below). The most charitable viewing of Morris’ decision to, basically, bench himself to preserve a year of eligibility is this: it speaks to college athletes’ increased power these days. They have a freedom that simply didn’t exist until fairly recently, and that’s a good thing. Morris may realize that his greatest earning power, as an athlete, might be as a college quarterback, and there’s nothing wrong with trying to maximize that.

THREE TO ... NOT LIKE AS MUCH

1. The M.J. Morris situation (Part II). On the other hand, then there’s this: Morris quit on his team. That may sound harsh, but it’s difficult to read the situation any other way. Yes, it’s good that college athletes have more freedom. They should. But the Morris situation also underscores the lack of real rules governing the relationship between schools and players. It’s also a bad look, that could come back to bite him. Regardless, more of this kind of stuff is probably to be expected until a more formal employee-employer model develops, with contracts.

2. These blasted 8 o’clock starts. Old man rant incoming in three ... two ... one: These dang 8 p.m. starts — closer to 8:10, actually — are just too late. Yes, Duke and UNC went into double-overtime Saturday night. A bad break, maybe, for anyone hoping to get home from it at a quasi-reasonable hour. But the game didn’t end until almost midnight. UNC’s postgame responsibilities, including the media sessions, didn’t end until close to 1 a.m. It’s too much. And it’s too late. A new college football law: No games starting past 7:30.

3. Bad officiating, everywhere. Look, complaints about refs and calls are never-ending among fans, in any sport. The officials hate your team. And they’re biased. It’s a conspiracy, against your team, in particular. We get it. That out of the way, ACC officials had an especially bad week. Some of the calls in Louisville’s victory against Virginia really did make you wonder if some kind of fix was in. Miami fans have a gripe about what went down in Tallahassee, at Florida State. And there were some real questionable moments Saturday night in Chapel Hill, too, where Duke coach Mike Elko got in a good workout with his gesticulations of angst following some of those calls.

THIS WEEK’S BEST PROGRAM IN THE STATE

With respect to the programs – or to the progrums, in the parlance of true Southern college football – in Raleigh and Chapel Hill, we’re representing the little guys this week. Or, the littler guys. Well, the smaller progrums, as it were.

How about ECU, getting up off the mat for a 22-7 victory against FAU? Finally, something good for the Pirates. How about Appalachian State, flexing its might with a 42-14 victory against a not-bad Georgia State team? It hasn’t been the best of falls for either of these teams, especially the one in Greenville, but on Saturday both played with some heart and hustle.

CAROLINAS RANKING

1. N.C. State (remember, after the loss at Duke, when it was fair to wonder when or if State would win another game? The Wolfpack hasn’t lost since); 2. Clemson (don’t look now, but Dabo seems to have found something that works — and just in time for UNC’s visit this weekend); 3. North Carolina (how good would the Tar Heels be if their defense didn’t wilt in the fourth quarter); 4. Duke (have to respect the approach Saturday night — onside kick; fake punt); 5. South Carolina (here by default); 6. Coastal Carolina; 7. Appalachian State; 8. Wake Forest (never good when the coach is apologizing to fans after a defeat); 9. Charlotte; 10. ECU.

FINAL THOUGHTS, IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER

--I think if you’re Nina King, Duke’s athletics director, these are very stressful times. You’ve found an outstanding head coach in Mike Elko, who seems to be a great institutional fit, as well. And now here comes an opening for the big job at Texas A&M, where Elko worked from 2018 through ‘21 as the defensive coordinator. Do they come for Elko? Is he happy enough at Duke? Is he crazy enough to want to enter one of the sport’s greatest infernos of pressure and expectation?

--I think back to that N.C. State-Louisville game, again. A game the Wolfpack should’ve won. Another what-if in an endless line of them for Wolfpack football. Win that, and State is suddenly the favorite to make it to Charlotte for the ACC championship game.

--I think, on that note, that this is arguably Dave Doeren’s finest coaching job. This is a team that had no offense for much of the season. That went through a quarterback change. That, now, saw the quarterback it promoted into the starting job decide to shut it down for the rest of the season. And yet State made it look easy Saturday in Winston-Salem (and place that hasn’t been easy for the Wolfpack) and it seems to be improving every week.

--I think it’s reaching a point of toxicity with UNC Nation (meaning: fans and supporters of the Tar Heels) and Gene Chizik, the embattled defensive coordinator. That UNC has won eight games with this defense tells you how good Drake Maye is.