— Whether coaches use push pins, staples or tape, most of them have bulletin boards in the locker room. During rivalry weeks, those boards tend to get filled up and this week in the Triangle there is no exception.

As North Carolina State prepares to host the University of North Carolina at Carter-Finley Stadium Saturday, the Tar Heels head man is making no secret that this in-state rivalry reaches beyond the gridiron.

“When you have as many schools in this state as you have and the recruiting base gets watered down a little bit, I think the kids in this state need to know ‘the flagship school,’” interim head coach Everett Withers said of the importance of the rivalry as he joined Adam and Joe on 99.9 The Fan ESPN Radio Wednesday. “They need to know it academically. If you look at our graduation rates opposed to our opponent this week’s graduation rates for football, I think you’ll see a difference. If you look at the educational environment here, I think you’ll see a difference.”

Despite the recent black eye that the UNC football team has suffered following an NCAA investigation that led to Withers taking the reigns on an interim basis, the Multi-Year Academic Progress Rate (APR) as calculated by the NCAA to reflect graduation rates in all sports of every member school, appear to defend Withers’ comments.

In the latest report, UNC scored 955 to NC State’s 929.

NC State head coach Tom O’Brien says that he’s used bulletin board material in the past, but he’s not sure his team really needs it this week. He also included a bit of a jab.

“I think in a game like this, if it takes something like that to get you excited then you are probably brain dead anyway,” O’Brien told Adam and Joe Wednesday. “You have to be ready to play no matter what the other team says one way or another.

“I have used things in the past that people have said about us. I think all that does is it sharply focuses the team on (how) they are perceived by someone else or the thought process of the other team,” O’Brien continued. “I don’t think that in the middle of the fourth quarter they go, ‘oh, well coach said this.’”

Having lost four consecutive games in the rivalry to NC State, Withers said that his seniors are aware of what’s at stake for the Tar Heel program.

“Emotionally, yeah, these kids understand,” Withers said. “Especially these seniors understand that this is an opportunity to get these things off of us. We put things in front of them, and challenge them, and they take the challenge.”

O’Brien said that the game is not about being a rivalry game, it is about getting his team a shot at making the post season. Needing to win three of their final four to become bowl eligible, O’Brien knows that the postseason is essentially now.

“Every game is a championship football game,” O’Brien said. “We treat every ACC game like that. We understand we are 2-2 in September, we’re 2-2 in October. If we’re going to have any chance to play postseason, we’re going to have to win the month of November. It starts here with North Carolina coming to town.”

After UNC this weekend, the Wolf pack will travel to Boston College next week before hosting Clemson and Maryland to finish the regular season.

“We try to get motivated for all 12 (games) and a bowl game,” Withers said. “I don’t know why they’re more motivated for us than any other game that they play. I hope they were motivated last week versus Florida St. We were versus Wake Forest.”

Withers and UNC, who clinched a bowl berth last week with that win over Wake Forest, said their goal is to win out – a schedule that has them at Virginia Tech and at home for Duke following this week.

“The goal is to win the rest of our football games; that’s the goal,” Withers said. “The goal is to be 4-0 in the state against state opponents and the goal is to play in the best situation we can play in in the postseason.”

Withers added that going unbeaten against four in-state opponents also sends a message to recruits.

“A guy told me a long time ago, you want to go to a school that has ‘the’ in front of it,” Withers said.