Lucas: Name On The Back

By Adam Lucas

BROOKLYN—Near tipoff on Wednesday night, Wes Durham was sharing a few moments with Jones Angell and Eric Montross before Carolina's game against Syracuse. Durham was calling the game on the ACC Network, and Angell and Montross were, of course, calling the action on Woody Durham's beloved Tar Heel Sports Network.

Woody, Wes's dad, had passed away less than 24 hours earlier. But Wes was still in Brooklyn, still behind the microphone, because that's what he thought his father would want him to do. Woody loved the ACC Tournament, loved calling every minute of every game on the radio. He valued the event, even taking a little pride in the fact that Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski would usually do a postgame interview with Woody if the Blue Devils won the tournament title; Krzyzewski, of course, would not do any other interviews with school broadcasts. But Woody was not just a school broadcaster. Woody was ACC royalty.

As Wes stood and talked, Roy Williams walked all the way across the court and wrapped Durham in a hug. Remember that when Williams came to Carolina as an assistant coach, Wes was a high schooler and was frequently around the program. In some ways, these two have grown up together personally and professionally.

Williams was wet-eyed before the men ever embraced. Wes emerged from the hug with tears in his eyes. "I think I'm OK," he quickly said with a grin, "and then he does something like that."

That's the kind of night it was in Brooklyn. It was the ACC Tournament, a game that Carolina won fairly easily, 78-59, over Syracuse. And if you just treated it as nothing more than a game, it was possible to make it through.

But there were other times when it wasn't that simple. During the Tar Heel Sports Network open, the combination of Jones Angell's words and Woody's famous calls left all four of us—Angell, Eric Montross, engineer Ben Alexander and me—sitting at the Barclays Center press table sniffling. The commercial break following that open was one of the most well-timed in history; otherwise the ensuing segment might have featured lots of nose-blowing.

Then the Tar Heels ran out of the tunnel in their white warm up shirts with identical names on the back. Every single shirt featured the name "Woody" where the player's last name otherwise might be.

The move was the brainchild of Eric Hoots, who grew up listening to Woody just like the rest of us and understands what the announcer means to the Carolina fan base. Beginning Wednesday morning as soon as he got the news, he was determined the team would make some visible gesture. He called Matt Horton, a Brooklyn Nets team staffer who has been an incredibly helpful liaison for the Tar Heels in multiple games at the Barclays Center.

That's how Horton and Hoots ended up in the Nets team store on Wednesday morning, pulling letters out of the pile that's normally reserved for heat-pressing names on the backs of jerseys that are sold to fans. They affixed the name to every shirt, then sat back and waited 30 minutes to make sure the adhesive would stick.

It did, and it was perfect. It was perhaps the only time in Carolina basketball history that playing for the name on the back of the jersey seemed as acceptable as playing for the name on the front. This is where I think we're supposed to say that Woody wouldn't have liked getting all that attention out on the court, but can I tell you something? I think Woody would have loved it, because Woody absolutely loved being a Tar Heel. He grew up wanting to be Charlie Justice. In second grade, while growing up in Mebane, he was given a number-22 jersey for Christmas, and he pretended to be Justice. Now here we were, 70 years later, and every Carolina player on the floor had a shirt that said "Woody" on the back.

Woody would have liked that. And he would have liked the way the Tar Heels played, too. Kenny Williams gave a lockdown defensive performance with blood streaming from his left elbow. Go to war, Ms. Agnes!

Theo Pinson had another double-double, this time with 16 points, 11 rebounds and six assists, several of the un-beee-leeeee-va-ble variety. The Tar Heels had eight steals, meaning eight times the Orange threw it away to…well, not Worthy, but other Tar Heels. Cam Johnson sank a pair of three-pointers, one of them a jumper from out on the left. Three different Carolina soph-o-mores played in the game. Aaron Rohlman entered late, and you could almost hear him being announced as being from GAS-tonia.

The game was so in hand there wasn't a need to go where we go (but it's March, so you just know it's coming soon). And when it was over, of course, Carolina has won the game. Good gosh, Gertie. You just know Woody would have had a sharp rebuke for Greensboro hater Jim Boeheim as the Orange dropped to 1-3 in all-time ACC Tournament games. "Did you hear what Woody said?" we would have asked our buddies at work on Thursday.

Maybe we'll eventually remember this as the game when Roy Williams tried to go Hulkamania on his suit jacket, which led to this postgame lecture from the head coach to his team:

"This is the advice I'm going to give you today," Williams told his team in the locker room. "If you want to rip a jacket, don't do it from the top. Turn it around and rip it from the bottom where the seam is already started. I try to always coach you guys. So that's how you rip a suit."

But more likely, this will be remembered as the game when the entire ACC, but especially the Carolina world, took a couple hours to remember just what a profound impact Woody Durham had on all of our lives. He told us Carolina stories for four decades. Now it's our responsibility to keep telling talking about our favorite Woody Durham moments.

Packing up the equipment after the Tar Heel Sports Network broadcast, well past midnight in Brooklyn, a conversation was ongoing about the prospect of food. THSN engineer Ben Alexander broke into a wide smile. "That reminds me of one of my favorite Woody stories," he said.

He began to tell his story, and very soon we were all laughing.

Players Mentioned

Theo Pinson

Aaron Rohlman

Kenny Williams

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