University of North Carolina Athletics
Lucas: The Carolina Way
November 12, 2005 | Men's Basketball
Nov. 12, 2005
By Adam Lucas
The man in the black sweater vest looked slightly out of place in the Smith Center media room. He didn't have a tape recorder, didn't have a pad, didn't even appear to have a pen. Just his black sweater vest with Catawba's "C" logo on the right chest.
Roy Williams was at the podium fielding questions after his team's 89-63 exhibition victory over Catawba. When he finished, he headed for his usual path out the back of the media room.
That's when the man in the black sweater vest, whose name turned out to be Dennis Davidson, stepped in Williams's path. The Carolina head coach gave him a quizzical look.
Davidson extended his hand. "I'm the Catawba athletic director," he said. "And I just wanted to thank you for shaking that kid's hand. That really meant a lot."
We didn't learn much about Carolina's 2005-06 basketball team on Saturday night that we didn't already know. The Tar Heels are young and will play young on most nights, meaning they'll have some spurts of baffling struggles and some spurts of high-flying success.
But we also were reminded, just in case we'd forgotten, that the program is in exactly the right hands. The hands of someone who understands the Carolina way and expects every person in his program to conduct themselves appropriately at all times.
Some context for those too crushed by the football loss to watch any hoops Saturday night: early in the second half, prize freshman Tyler Hansbrough was headed toward the basket for an apparent easy fast-break dunk. That's when Catawba's Andy Thomson bear hugged him. He didn't make an effort to go for the ball and Hansbrough went down in a heap, causing a brief moment of major panic for the crowd of 16,334.
Thomson briefly looked like he wanted to step toward Hansbrough--who, to his credit, simply got up and shot the free throws--and apologize for the play, but thought better of it when confronted by a wall of four Tar Heels headed by David Noel.
That could have been the end of it. That would have been the end of it at most any arena in the country. Catawba coach Jim Baker removed Thomson from the game and play continued.
But when Thomson reentered the game a few minutes later, Williams was visibly agitated by the fact that the Smith Center crowd was booing him when he touched the ball. The head Tar Heel walked to the scorer's table and tried to get PA announcer Kearney Andrews to instruct the crowd not to boo the guest. When that action failed to soothe the masses, he waited for Thomson to be removed from the game and walked 40 feet down the sideline to the Indians bench. He grabbed Thomson and shook his hand, making a visible statement to the crowd. It's pretty simple: within the confines of the Smith Center, if someone is OK with Roy Williams, they're OK with the rest of us.
Thomson was treated with respect the rest of the night.
"I was upset," Williams said. "I realized after a couple seconds it was a mistake. Our fans were booing him every time he touched the ball and I wanted them to stop. The kid made a mistake."
The kid will also remember the reaction to his mistake--that moment when one of the winningest coaches in the game came looking to extend an olive branch--for the rest of his life. Baker called it "a class move" and that might have been an understatement. It's hard to picture many other coaches doing something similar.
Williams wants a wild, raucous homecourt advantage in the Smith Center. But he wants to accomplish it the right way.
Carolina goes into next weekend's season opener with plenty of unknowns. The point guard situation is unsettled (don't read too much into Bobby Frasor's start against Catawba, as Quentin Thomas had missed practice Friday with a nagging foot injury), the interior is thin, and on its best nights the squad is going to be unpredictable.
But one thing will be perfectly predictable. Their head coach hasn't changed one bit since he charged onto the Charlotte Coliseum court in the second game of his UNC head coaching career to discipline Sean May for too much on-court woofing.
He's going to teach his team to run. He's going to teach them to play defense. He's going to teach them to win.
And he'll demand they do it the Carolina way.
Adam Lucas is the publisher of Tar Heel Monthly and can be reached at alucas@tarheelmonthly.com. He is the coauthor of the official book of the 2005 championship season, Led By Their Dreams, and his book on Roy Williams's first season at Carolina, Going Home Again, is now available in bookstores. To subscribe to Tar Heel Monthly or learn more about Going Home Again, click here.
