Sports in North Carolina
The first successful major professional sports team to be created in North Carolina were the Charlotte Hornets of the National Basketball Association (NBA), which began play in the 1988–89 season.
The Hornets played at the Charlotte Coliseum before moving to New Orleans following a bitter dispute between team ownership and the city over funding for a new arena.
Two years after the Hornets decamped the Queen City was named as the home of the expansion Charlotte Bobcats who would play two seasons at the Coliseum before taking up residence at a new venue now known as Spectrum Center in Uptown.
North Carolina State and Wake Forest are also considered major rivals of the Blue Devils and Tar Heels, for more on the four-way rivalry see Tobacco Road.
Although North Carolina did not have a major-league professional sports franchise until the 1980s, the state has long been known as a hotbed of college basketball.
North Carolina schools have also won multiple NCAA Division II basketball national championships.
In 1989, North Carolina Central University, which is now a Division I member, brought the title to the state a second time; winning the championship game by 27 points, which remains the largest margin of victory in its history.
North Carolina has a large number of historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) with long athletic traditions and deep fan bases as well.
Ten HBCUs participate in NCAA college sports in North Carolina, with all but North Carolina A&T State University (the largest HBCU in the U.S.) playing in either the Division II Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association (CIAA) or the Division I Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference (MEAC).
The National Football League (NFL) is represented by the Carolina Panthers, who began play in 1995, and call Charlotte's Bank of America Stadium home.
Only two states have more universities fielding teams at the NCAA's highest level, Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS).
Before moving to FBS and the Sun Belt Conference in 2014, Appalachian State won FCS national titles in 2005, 2006 and 2007.
Located in Greenville the Pirates won both the 2008 and 2009 Conference USA Football Championship and have a large and passionate fan base.
The Panthers played their first season in 1995 at Memorial Stadium on the campus of Clemson University in neighboring South Carolina.
[1] North Carolina is a center in American motorsports, with more than 80% of NASCAR racing teams and related industries located in the Piedmont region.
In off-road motorcycle racing, the Grand National Cross Country series makes three stops in North Carolina, Morganton, Wilkesboro and Yadkinville; the only other state to host two GNCC events is Ohio.
Many of NASCAR's most famous driver dynasties, the Pettys, Earnhardts, Allisons, Jarretts and Waltrips all live within an hour's drive of Charlotte.
Two families from North Carolina, the Pettys and the Earnhardts, have had several members that achieved varying levels of success in NASCAR competitions and are a source of pride for Carolinians and Southerners in general.
His son Dale would become a major star in the sport, winning 76 Cup series races and tying Richard Petty's record of 7 championships before his death on the final lap of the 2001 Daytona 500.
Outside of the Earnhardt and Petty clans North Carolina is home to many other current and former NASCAR drivers such as Junior Johnson (Wilkes County), Richard Childress (Winston-Salem), Ned and Dale Jarrett (both Newton), Andy Petree (Hickory), Rick Hendrick (Warrenton), Brian Vickers (Thomasville), and Scott Riggs (Durham) Once a major part of the NASCAR circuit, North Carolina now only has one track on the schedule that hosts a points-paying race, Charlotte.
The track, actually in Concord, hosts three Cup Series events every season, including the NASCAR Sprint All-Star Race (formerly The Winston).
The winner of the race earns tremendous respect among peers and fans due to the distance and the weather (North Carolina is known for extremely humid and hot summers).
The NWSL team was then relocated from Rochester, New York, to Cary, moving to NCFC's home of WakeMed Soccer Park.
The men's program at NC State has enjoyed the most success, bringing home 25 Atlantic Coast Conference Championships, more than any other ACC team.
Under his guidance, SwimMAC has been named USA Swimming's club of the year and is widely regarded as one of the best programs in the country.
In 2012, SwimMAC's "Team Elite", personally coached by Marsh, produced five Olympians: Nick Thoman, Micah Lawrence, Kara Lynn Joyce, Davis Tarwater, and Cullen Jones.
Rugby union is seeing a major increase in popularity in North Carolina and the Southeastern United States, with the NCYRU's JV and Varsity all-star squads winning the regional southeast RAST (Rugby All Star Tournament) in 2014, with both teams undefeated in the tournament.
Also, the former chairman of WWE, Vince McMahon, was born in Pinehurst, attended East Carolina University, and was married in New Bern.
Ultimate in North Carolina is increasingly popular with youth, collegiate, club, and professional teams all competitive at the national level.
The North Carolina Sports Hall of Fame was established in February 1963, with the support of the Charlotte Chamber of Commerce, "to honor those persons who by excellence of their activities in or connected with the world of sports have brought recognition and esteem to themselves and to the State of North Carolina."
