After beating Duke on the road to finish the regular season, North Carolina's football team got a little carried away with the celebration. The players took cans of spray paint -- Tar Heel blue, if you were wondering -- and defaced the visitor's locker room, the practice field turf and the Victory Bell on the Duke campus.

Shortly thereafter, Duke submitted a bill to UNC, and the price was steep: $27,170.44 for repairs.

And not a penny less.

According to The News-Observer, which broke the story, most of the costs -- slightly over $22,000 -- went to re-carpeting the visitor's locker room. Duke cited 60 carpet tiles that were so damaged by spray paint that they couldn't be cleaned.

In other parts of the stadium, "UNC" was spray-painted onto several walls, which required cleaning, and the practice field was defaced with a 20-yard-long line of paint.

According to emails between the administration at both schools, North Carolina's coach called Duke coach David Cutliffe six days after the game to apologize for his team's behavior. Cutliffe apparently never returned the call, which irked North Carolina.

UNC athletic director Bubba Cunningham also expressed that he didn't understand how the costs for cleaning and repair could be so high, but rather than dispute them expressly, he only apologized on behalf of his school. UNC players had their per diem meal funds for their next football game taken away as punishment for the actions, and both Cunningham and UNC coach Larry Fedora split the cost of Duke's bill, writing personal checks.

So it's mostly a problem that's in the rear-view mirror for both programs. But when some Duke fans defaced property on UNC's campus after a basketball game earlier this year, North Carolina could have sent a corresponding bill to its rival school. Instead, it ate the cost.

The message? Don't be so petty, Blue Devils.

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