University of North Carolina Athletics
CAR-O-LINES: O'Koren Was A Big-Game Player
January 29, 2004 | Men's Basketball
Jan. 29, 2004
By Rick Brewer
He is rarely mentioned when fans talk about Carolina's greatest players.
Maybe that's because Mike O'Koren wasn't a dominating presence inside or a star playmaker in the backcourt. He usually wasn't even the most prolific scorer in a game.
Perhaps he was best known as Rosie O'Koren's son. The kid from Jersey City. That's actually the way he preferred to look at it.
But as far as doing everything well and whatever was needed to win, he has had few equals in Tar Heel history. He's still the only Carolina player with at least 1,500 points (1,765), 800 rebounds (815) and 300 assists (348). He also had 183 steals and a career field goal percentage of 57.2.
This season marks the 25th anniversary of one of the most unusual years of the Dean Smith coaching era. The key figure on that team was O'Koren, a 6-7 junior forward, who many people would have never regarded as a leader after his first two years on campus.
However, he had been playing alongside superstars who generally got most of the attention. With those players gone in 1979, he took center stage in the Carolina lineup.
It was the loss of those standouts from the great teams of the mid-1970's that made the success of 1979 unexpected to many. Phil Ford had graduated the previous year and some even said the Tar Heels might have been on a downward spiral.
Carolina was picked to finish third or lower in all the 1979 ACC pre-season polls. But, Dudley Bradley, the nation's best defensive player, and Al Wood, one of the top shooters in the college game, each improved their play on the opposite ends of the court. With O'Koren already capable of doing everything the Tar Heels posted a 23-6 record, tied for first place in the league's regular-season race, swept the ACC Tournament and finished third nationally in the final coaches' poll.
Wood was the team's top scorer (17.9), but O'Koren was right behind him at 14.8. His 7.2 rebounding average led his team and ranked fifth in the ACC. He was fifth in the league in assists, sixth in free throw percentage (76.6) and fifth in field goal percentage at 52.1. He and Bradley were Carolina's best defensive players.
O'Koren didn't exactly come from nowhere to have this success. Even on a talent-laden 1977 team he had averaged 13.9 points per game, scored 21 points against Duke in the ACC championship game and had 31 in the NCAA semi-finals against UNLV.
As a sophomore his scoring rose to 17.8. He scored in double figures every game and was second nationally with a 64.3 field goal percentage.
Then came 1979 with Ford, Walter Davis, Tommy LaGarde and company gone.
O'Koren was at his best in the biggest games. He grabbed a career-high 20 rebounds, scored 17 points, handed out seven assists and had four steals in a 74-68 homecourt win over Duke. He also held Gene Banks scoreless in the second half of that game. He finished with 22 points and five assists in a double overtime win over Virginia. In the ACC Tournament finals against Duke he had 18 points and 11 rebounds. He scored Carolina's final 10 points that day in a 71-63 victory.
O'Koren had honed his basketball skills on the playgrounds of Jersey City. Located just a short train ride from New York, it was a blue-collar town where you could easily find trouble or have it find you.
"Basically, there were two groups of kids-one group ended up in trouble and the other played basketball," he said. "Fortunately, I ended up in the right one."
The street smarts O'Koren needed in Jersey City probably helped develop his tremendous court savvy. He had great instincts offensively and defensively.
Perhaps no one at Carolina has ever moved without the ball as well as O'Koren. He got more backdoor layups than opposing teams.
"It helped to have Phil handling the basketball," said O'Koren back then. "If you could get a step on a backdoor cut, he'd get you the ball."
O'Koren was so smart he usually didn't get just a step but would break completely free underneath. After Ford graduated it was O'Koren who often brought the ball upcourt against pressure defenses and ran Carolina's four corners offense. He was as adept at leading a fast break as finishing it.
"It was important back home not to control the ball all the time," said O'Koren. "Guys wouldn't play with people who did that. So you learned to move without it and handle it with care when you got it."
O'Koren had a close relationship with his mother. His dad had died when he was young and Rose had to raise three children on a low-paying job.
"It wasn't easy, but she always took care of us," said O'Koren. "and she was the best cook in town. Nobody could top her lasagna or baked ziti. Everything-salads, meatballs, sausages-was great."
Mike knew things had been tough. When he got to Chapel Hill he regularly talked about her and what she meant to him.
"My mother trusted me to take care of myself while she was working," he said. "I tried to return that by never doing anything to hurt her."
There was never a dull moment with O'Koren in Chapel Hill. He brought enthusiasm and intensity to every game. He played with an emotion that could shake an arena. But, O'Koren had the personality to also joke with officials and opposing players and coaches during breaks in the action.
Most people only saw the happy kid with a wonderful New Jersey accent who played with abandon the court. But he also was sensitive and sincere in dealing with others. He took losses hard, but was always willing to talk to writers after a game. He was a media favorite because of his sense of humor and pure honesty.
He didn't score as many points as many players, but he didn't shoot as much. The style of play he had learned on the Jersey City courts fit perfectly at Carolina. He didn't care about statistics, just winning. It was for that all-around play that he twice was named a first-team All-America.
And that's also why he should always be mentioned among this school's greatest players.
