Mack Brown: 'I said, you're not going to die, but you're damn sure sick because you ate some of that cheese.'

Before there was rat poison, there was poison cheese.

As his Tar Heels, undefeated and ranked 10th, look to move on from Saturday night's 41-31 win over then-No. 25 Miami and move on to Virginia, Mack Brown brought a story out of the archives.

Brown recalled a story from 2005 when Texas, undefeated and ranked second, prepared to go on the road to face Texas A&M. Brown got a call from Dallas Cowboys head coach Bill Parcells -- Parcells, linebackers coach, and Brown, a running back spent 1972 together at Florida State -- with a warning in the form of a metaphor.

At the time, Texas was rolling. Not only had the Longhorns already won at Ohio State and slain Oklahoma for the first time in six years, they'd rallied from a 28-9 deficit to win at Oklahoma State 47-28 and bludgeoned Baylor 62-0 before throttling Kansas 66-14. Over a span of eight quarters plus one play, Texas went on a 152-0 scoring run against three different opponents leading into the A&M game. 

A&M, meanwhile, was 4-7 on the year. The game was in College Station, but Texas entered as 29-point favorites. 

And, to Parcells, that was entirely the problem. 

"He said, 'You're in trouble, man. And I'm thinking, 'We just won 66-14. We're doing good, man.' And he said, you're in trouble because you're sitting around talking about you. You're talking about USC and the national championship game. This is Texas A&M's bowl game. Their only chance to save their season is to beat you, and you aren't even thinking about them. You're like that big rat that's eating the poison cheese. You're going to eat the poison cheese and you're going to die. 

"I mean, I got scared to death sitting there on the phone," Brown remembered.

The Big Tuna's warning proved prophetic. Brown recalled the Aggies leading 29-24 at the half (the score was actually Texas 21, A&M 15), but his halftime message was crystal clear 18 years later:

"I said, 'We're going to win the game and you're not going to die, but you're damn sure sick because you ate some of that cheese," Brown said. 

Texas A&M took a 22-21 lead early in the third quarter before Texas slowly but surely pulled away for a more-difficult-than-everyone-but-Bill-Parcells-anticipated 40-29 win. 

The following week, Texas beat Colorado 70-3 in the Big 12 Championship. 

Brown would surely prefer North Carolina skip past the Texas A&M performance and go straight to the Colorado game this weekend against Virginia. 

As always, stay tuned to The Scoop for the latest.