University of North Carolina Athletics
Lucas: Snow Brings Back Memories
January 3, 2002 | Men's Basketball
Jan. 3, 2002
By Adam Lucas
TarHeelBlue.com
Carolina fans can be forgiven for experiencing a bit of d?j? vu this morning.
With unusually deep snow on the ground and an important Atlantic Coast Conference basketball game approaching this weekend, it's easy to flash back to a long, long time ago when Tar Heel fans had a "wine-and-cheese" reputation.
Yes, new Carolina fans, there was a time when the riser section of students didn't exist. Long ago, in the dark ages, there were no Doherty's Disciples or t-shirt tosses.
In fact, it was a day very much like this one when everything began to change. Bill Guthridge's Tar Heels were scheduled to take on the Maryland Terrapins in January of 2000. But a freak snowstorm dropped so much winter precipitation on the area that even the usually nonplussed Northern transplants were impressed.
Even a couple days after the storm, traveling still wasn't easy. And so athletic department officials made a decision that has shaped much of the past two years. Ticket-holding fans were given a chance to claim their seats, but shortly before tipoff, students were allowed to claim any untaken seats. The result was a mad frenzy that featured students climbing across the courtside Barcaloungers and standing for much of the game.
And, oh yes, the Tar Heels won the game. After the victory, several Tar Heels commented on the unusual Smith Center atmosphere. A crusade was born.
Carolina Athletics Association president Tee Pruitt had quietly been working for better student seating even before the Great Snow Game. The win over Maryland provided all the momentum he would need.
When Matt Doherty was hired in the summer of 2000, he immediately expressed a desire to be accessible and open with students. That came to fruition a few months later, when the athletics department and Educational Foundation announced a joint plan to move the students closer to the court. For the first time in recent memory, the goals of each individual organization seemed to be congruent instead of opposing.
"Right now, I think we've got an unprecedentedly strong relationship with the Educational Foundation and athletic department," Pruitt said at the time.
Two years later, it's evident that that cooperation has spawned an energized Carolina fan base. The student riser seats have been a huge hit, although their occupants sometimes could use a little more originality. There are occasional lapses of bad taste and Duke replication, of which the latter is of course a more serious offense. But it's impossible to argue that getting the students behind the basket hasn't been a positive for everyone involved.
The enthusiasm generated by the new seating plan seems to be slowly spreading throughout the fan base. Over 24,000 Tar Heel fans followed the football team to Atlanta this weekend for the Peach Bowl, which left many administrators concerned about attendance at the Texas A&M basketball game Sunday night. But over 15,000 fans still filled the Dean Dome, an outstanding number that would have been a season high at seven of the other eight Atlantic Coast Conference schools.
Snow can have strange effects. It makes some overconfident people drive like Bobby Labonte, makes others feel like a kid again, and makes all of us eagerly watch the bottom-of-the-screen crawls for the much-anticipated closings and delays.
And sometimes, it can even initiate a change in an entire athletic department. The snow will probably be melting by the time the Deacs come to town on Saturday. But the remnants of the last "snow game" will still be evident.
Adam Lucas is the co-publisher of Basketball America. He is a lifelong observer of UNC sports and can be reached at JAdamLucas@aol.com.
