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UNC’s 1980 National Champion Football Team
by Charly Mann
The University of North Carolina has fielded NCAA champions in Men's Basketball six times, Men's Lacrosse four times, and Women's Soccer 20 times, but has always had a reputation for a mediocre football program. Over the course of the football team's history of more than 120 years they have a winning percentage of only 56%, and most of these wins came over much smaller schools with weaker rosters. Nonetheless, football is a beloved sport in Chapel Hill because it is played in the most beautiful stadium and setting in the country, usually under gorgeous autumn skies. While the weather may be ideal, the coeds in attendance beautiful, and the smuggled in alcoholic beverages invigorating, the final score of most important games is usually disappointing.
Famous Amos Lawrence rushing for a UNC touchdown in the 1980 season
In 1980, something quite amazing happened in Chapel Hill. Not only did UNC field a great football team, but they were in Chapel Hill Memories unbiased estimation the college national champions that year. The team was incredible on both defense and offense, and could have held its own against any NFL team at the time. UNC crushed virtually all of its opponents holding most of them to less than 10 points, while its offensive juggernaut led by the two greatest running backs in Carolina history, "Famous" Amos Lawrence and Kelvin Bryant, was unstoppable. Not only did UNC go undefeated in the ACC, but the only league game that was even a challenge was beating Clemson 24-19 at Death Valley.
Lawrence Taylor, UNC's greatest defensive player, sacks another quaterback
Kelvin Bryant (44) and Amos Lawrence (20) celebrate that UNC is the #1 football team in 1980
As a small footnote, UNC did lose one game that season to highly regarded Oklahoma on their home field in Norman, Oklahoma under the helm of the greatest college football coach of all time, Barry Switzer (can you tell I now live in Oklahoma?), but that game is really irrelevant. You see on December 31, 1980 at the Bluebonnet Bowl in Houston, UNC defeated Texas 16 to 7. Now this is significant for those of us determining the national championship for that year. UNC beat Texas in the state of Texas on a field that was almost like a home game for the Longhorns. Two months earlier Texas had beat Oklahoma at their annual Red River Shootout at the neutral Cotton Bowl in Dallas 20 to 13. It does not take a math genius to see that UNC vindicated their one blemish to clearly establish that they were the best team in the country in 1980. For the record, three of the teams that various polls awarded the National Championship to that year, Florida State, Nebraska, and Oklahoma all had worse records than UNC at 10-2. UNC was 11-1.
The University of North Carolina beats Texas in the Bluebonnet Bowl on Dec 31, 1980 to avenge their only defeat of the regular season
Among the stars of this great team was Amos Lawrence (1977-1980) who had an incredible four seasons at UNC where he rushed for over 1,000 yards. As a freshman he rushed for 286 yards in one game against Virginia. In 1980, he carried the ball for 11 touchdowns. His fellow running back Kelvin Bryant had three consecutive 1,000 plus yard seasons at Carolina. They usually ran behind All-American guard and team co-captain, Ron Wooten. The defense was anchored by the greatest defensive player in the history of football, Lawrence Taylor. As a linebacker he was so intimidating that he instilled fear in our entire opponent's offense. In 1980 alone Taylor sacked the opposing quarterbacks 16 times. His jersey, #98, was later retired in his honor. Fellow linebacker Darrell Nicholson was almost as great as Taylor, and also was an All-American that year. Defensive tackle Donnel Thompson was so good at stopping running backs that his linebackers could concentrate on blitzing the quarterback or additional pass defense.
UNC's 1980 regular season football record. They also beat Texas in the Bluebonnet Bowl to finish 11-1. This was UNC's best season record ever.
Comments:
Doris Anthony
4:15 PM Wed 7/14/2010
This afternoon my Grandfather asked me to see if I could find a picture of Amos Lawrence on the internet and I find this article. These comments make make me laugh. I am 16, and to see men taking who was football champion in 1980 so seriously seems ridiculous. Why is this so important?
So for you men - The #1 public university as ranked by most surveys is William and Mary. UNC is a respectable #7 and the University of Georgia is #29. Why don't you guys argue about this instead.
TARDAWG
2:16 PM Wed 7/14/2010
I think if you list the score of that one defeat in the article the line of "two months earlier Texas had beat Oklahoma at their annual Red River Shootout at the neutral Cotton Bowl in Dallas 20 to 13. It does not take a math genius to see that UNC vindicated their one blemish to clearly establish that they were the best team in the country in 1980" becomes a complete joke.
I am both a TAR HEEL and Dawgs fan, but this makes UNC football historians look stupid.
Charly Mann
12:34 PM Wed 7/14/2010
This posting was made in early September of 2009. In the last two days (Mid July 2010) there have been a slew of anonymous comments. If you leave your full name and e-mail address (which I will need to verify) - I will leave your comment up. Otherwise I will delete it like it is spam.
Don Moore
10:23 AM Wed 7/14/2010
1 loss vs. 0 loss
Bluebonnet Bowl vs. Sugar Bowl
UPI and AP champs vs. Charlie champs
UGA beat
Clemson
Tech
Florida
Tennessee
Auburn
South Carolina (Undefeated at time with Hiesman winner Rodgers)
Texas A&M
TCU
And Notre Dame in Bowl
And lost to no one. Your revisonist history is interesting but flawed. UNC is kings of basketball, but not football. Still upset you didn't beat GT in 1990 knocking them out of Mythical Championship.
Not even a mention of University of Georgia in that whole article. Leave this response in comments so your readers can get the Paul Harvey "Rest of the story"
Charly Mann
9:40 AM Wed 7/14/2010
As I said in Chapel Hill Memories "opinion" they were the national champs. As many of you know for many years there were two or three teams declared National Champs by various polls.
I did note UNC had one lost to Oklahoma, but UNC beat a team (Texas) in their BOWL game had beaten Oklahoma earlier in that season.
For the record I live in Oklahoma, and have been a University of Texas (where my daughter went to college) football fan for twenty years. During the past two decades I have seen several national championship Oklahoma and Texas teams in person, and in my opinion none were as good as the 1980 UNC team. I also attended one Pitt game that year and can say Carolina was a much better team.
Bert Maxwell
9:14 AM Wed 7/14/2010
The UNC team was beaten soundly by Oklahoma, while Georgia finished the season undefeated. Pitt was also 11-1 that season with their only loss, a close one to Florida State. It was an incredible UNC team, but they were in no way the National Champions of that season.
Charly Mann
8:39 AM Wed 7/14/2010
There has recently been comments attributed to me on this article that are totally untrue, as well as malicious comments from sources that did not leave a real name or e-mail address.
If those individuals wish to comment on the article again I invite them to e-mail me at the Chapel Hill Memories e-mail address and give me their phone number, and I will call them to discuss their comments.
I have now deactivated all the mentioned comments.
Ronnie Williams
4:12 AM Fri 1/8/2010
I remember this season. It is probably the first season of any sport I remember. I watched the Steelers beat the Rams, but I was in my awakening around this time. Famous Amos was my hero and I will always love Carolina for Steve Streeter and LT. I must admit I love Rod Elkin too. I must say though that as a child of 7 I did not realize the Heels had the best record and were snubbed as National Champions that year. I watched the Bluebonnet Bowl I remember that. They beat Texas, I was so happy. It did not occur to me at the time they were 11-1 and the other teams in the hunt were 10-2 I feel outraged. Thanks for this education!!
Even though it is 30 yrs later we need more vocalization on this. Choo choo demands it. Pride is recruiting and there is plenty of pride here to build on we just need to not let it die. Go Heels, recruiters take heed to the 30 for 30 film about Miami. Take a look at your own state and keep in mind that there is more talent in the state than at the 4A level. Small town kids with talent would love to go to Chapel Hill so bring em home. Kevin Wilson is at Oklahoma why? That guy is a huge coaching talent who could recruit anywhere, but I'll bet he could recruit the pants off of anyone in this area. If he were at UNC, Spikes doesn't go to Florida nor does any of the top notch talent that consistently leaves the state. Go Heels!!
Kyle Davis
3:58 PM Sat 9/12/2009
I wonder why UNC has never been in the same class of football as teams like Florida State, USC, Notre Dame, Alabama, Oklahoma, Penn State, or Texas. It would seem that UNC has the enrollment and facilities to develop an elite football program.
Peter Garrett
11:28 AM Fri 9/11/2009
Amos Lawrence deserves the attention he got. I think he had almost 5000 yards of rushing offense in his Carolina Career. The last I heard he was working at his old high school, Lake Taylor, in Norfolk Virginia. I think Carolina should consider having a special day to honor him, and retire his jersey.
Jack Arthur
5:51 PM Thu 9/10/2009
I love the tradition of Carolina football. It bothers me when a UNC basketball team has a poor season, but that is our heritage. Football for a true Tarheel fan has got to be more of a social experience, where expecting more than comradery should not be desired. I wish instead of posting the scores of football games the headlines would proclaim something like "Carolina Played Hard On a Beautiful Afternoon".
Laura Jasper (UNC 94)
11:41 AM Thu 9/10/2009
It does not matter how good or bad Carolina is, especially on a beautiful fall day when the surrounding oaks are in peak colors and the bell tower and splendid pines accentuate the background.
David Carpenter
5:54 PM Wed 9/9/2009
Most of my life the UNC football program has been like a horror story. They run poorly conceived plays, lose to opponents they should beat, and I always use to think things will get better, but they never did. Mack Brown was the last coach we had that knew how to create a first-rate team. Recently UNC either has an offense or defense that stinks. A school with the enrollment and facilities that Carolina has should do better, and at least be a regular contender in the ACC race. I wish I was old enough to have remembered this 1980 team (I was born in 1977).
Thomas Frank
3:48 PM Wed 9/9/2009
I think that the fact that UNC’s non-conference opponents this year are Connecticut, Georgia Southern, and The Citdadel, tells us that UNC’s atheletic department has no pride, and will go to the bottom of the barrel to insure victories. UNC should look to this 1980 team for inspiration, and aim high in its goals and recruitment effort.
Big Ram
2:43 PM Wed 9/9/2009
Thanks's for giving UNC its first football national championship. As you may know there was no "official" NCAA football champion until the BCS bowl series started in 1998, so you bestowing the Tarheels this crown is really all the legitmacy they need.
I suggest we start a fundraider to give the University a trophy to display for this national championship.
Chapel Hill is located on a hill whose only distinguishing feature in the 18th century was a small chapel on top called New Hope Chapel. This church was built in 1752 and is currently the location of The Carolina Inn. The town was founded in 1819, and chartered in 1851.
What is it that binds us to this place as to no other? It is not the well or the bell or the stone walls. or the crisp October nights. No, our love for this place is based upon the fact that it is as it was meant to be, The University of the People.
-- Charles Kuralt
Dark Side of the Hill -- Pink Floyd, the creators of the most popular album in history, Dark Side of the Moon, took the second half of their name from Floyd Council, a Chapel Hill native, and great blues singer and guitarist. He once belonged to a group called "The Chapel Hillbillies".
Check out Charly Mann's other website:
Oklahoma Birds and Butterflies
http://oklahomabirdsandbutterflies.com
Oklahoma Birds and Butterflies
http://oklahomabirdsandbutterflies.com
There would probably be no Chapel Hill if the University of North Carolina Board of Trustees in 1793 had not chosen land across from New Hope Chapel for the location of the university. By 1800 there were about 100 people living in thirty houses surrounding the campus.
The University North Carolina's first student was Hinton James, who enrolled in February, 1795. There is now a dormitory on the campus named in his honor.
The University of North Carolina was closed from 1870 to 1875 because of lack of state funding.
William Ackland left his art collection and $1.25 million to Duke University in 1940 on the condition that he would be buried in the art museum that the University was to build with his bequest. Duke rejected this condition even though members of the Duke Family are buried in Duke Chapel. What followed was a long and acrimonious legal battle between Ackland relatives who now wanted the inheritance, Rollins College, and the University of North Carolina, each attempting to receive the funds. The case went all the way to the United States Supreme Court, and in 1949 UNC was awarded the money for the museum. Ackland is buried near the museum's entrance. When the museum first opened, in the early sixties, there were rumors that his remains were leaking out of the mausoleum.
The official name of the Arboretum on the University of North Carolina campus is the Coker Arboretum. It is named after Dr. William Cocker, the University's first botany professor. It occupies a little more than five acres. It was founded in 1903.
Chapel Hill's main street has always been called Franklin Street. It was named after Benjamin Franklin in the early 1790s.
Chapel Hill High School and Chapel Hill Junior High were on Franklin Street in the same location as University Square until the mid 1960s.
The Colonial Drug Store at 450 West Franklin Street was owned and operated by John Carswell. It was famous for a fresh-squeezed carbonated orange beverage called a "Big O". In the early 1970s, I managed the Record and Tape Center next door, and must have had over 100 of those drinks. The Colonial Drug Store closed in 1996.
Sutton's Drugstore, which opened in 1923, has one of the last soda fountains in the South. It is one of the few businesses remaining on Franklin Street that was in operation when I was growing up in the 1950s.
Future President Gerald Ford lived in Chapel Hill twice. First when he was 24, in 1938, he took a law couse in summer school at UNC. He lived in the Carr Building, which was a law school dormitory. At the same time, Richard Nixon, the man he served under as Vice President, was attending law school at Duke. In 1942, Ford returned to Chapel Hill to attend the U.S. Navy's Pre-Flight School training program. He lived in a rental house on Hidden Hills Drive.
This is really a stretch, don't ya think Charly? UGA was 12-0 in 1980, defeating Notre Dame in the Sugar Bowl. UNC had a great season, but were blown out by OU - there is really no comparison.
" For the record, three of the teams that various polls awarded the National Championship to that year, Florida State, Nebraska, and Oklahoma all had worse records than UNC at 10-2." I'd be curious as to what polls other than the AP and UPI you might have consulted for this blog.
BTW, @ Doris, if this article focused on the best public colleges rankings, we'd discuss that, too.
Charly, feel free to contact me.