University of North Carolina Athletics
Lucas: Tar Heels Reintroduce Themselves
June 4, 2006 | Baseball
June 4, 2006
By Adam Lucas
The bass started thumping before Mike Fox even poked his head out of the dugout.
Carolina held a commanding 14-2 lead over Winthrop in Sunday night's championship round of the Chapel Hill regional. It was the eighth inning, clouds were darkening, and an ominous weather front was moving into the area.
But Fox had a plan. And unlike some other coaches who would have deviated when it became clear there might be a weather delay if things didn't progress speedily, he was going to follow the plan.
He'd removed Andrew Miller in Saturday's win over Winthrop in the middle of the ninth inning, allowing the rangy lefty to bask in a thunderous ovation from the Boshamer Stadium crowd in what might have been his final trip off the home mound.
He'd removed Daniel Bard earlier Sunday, also in the middle of an inning, allowing the powerful righty to enjoy the same memory-making departure.
And he was determined to do the same thing for senior reliever Jonathan Hovis. It didn't matter if the rains came and the winds blew. Fox was going to give Hovis his moment from the appreciative home fans. It was a Dean Smith kind of thing to do, and there's a good chance Fox would have done it whether the Tar Heels were ahead 14-2 or behind 14-2. That's part of who he is.
So with Winthrop's Jake Shaffer stepping into the box and two outs in the eighth, Fox emerged from the Carolina dugout. Suddenly, the coach who sometimes requests the lowering of the PA system volume during batting practice was accompanied by the thumping beats of Jay Z's "Allow Me To Reintroduce Myself."
The first line?
"Allow me to reintroduce myself/My name is `Hov'/ H to the O-V..."
That's been Hovis's signature song since he arrived at Carolina. NCAA rules prohibit homestanding teams from playing the normal at-bat songs during a regional. But music during a pitching change? Well, that's flexible, and the maestros in the Boshamer press box just happened to pick Jay-Z for Hovis's final stroll off the mound.
"You couldn't ask for a better day," Hovis said. "You couldn't ask for a better regional. You couldn't ask for a better atmosphere and getting to pitch the last game was special. The crowd was great and it was something I'll remember forever."
That's just part of what turned out to be a remarkably perfect regional weekend in Chapel Hill.
The Tar Heels blitzed through the field, compiling a 3-0 mark and drubbing opponents by a combined 43-13 score. They rediscovered potent offense up and down the lineup, bashing seven home runs by four different players during the weekend. They got good pitching from the entire weekend starting rotation and from a bullpen anchored by Hovis. Impressive crowds that nearly topped 3,000 on Saturday and Sunday packed Boshamer Stadium, emphatically answering the question of whether Chapel Hill can support a regional.
Oh, and the Tar Heels moved on to the super-regional round for the second time in Fox's tenure and first time since 2003. They'll travel to Tuscaloosa next weekend for a best-of-three series against Alabama for the chance to go to the College World Series in Omaha.
The team that played in Chapel Hill this weekend bore no resemblance to the team that went 0-2 in Jacksonville at the ACC Tournament last weekend. That team was unfamiliar. They didn't pitch consistently. They didn't get big hits. They didn't seem to be having much fun between the lines. They weren't, in other words, the same 2006 Diamond Heels that have played so well since mid-February.
This weekend, the Boshamer throngs were reintroduced to the Tar Heel team that provided so many winning moments this season. It was the return of a different Tar Heel squad entirely--the one that began this year considered to be among the nation's leading contenders for postseason honors.
"It's amazing," said freshman catcher Tim Federowicz, who was a scorching 9-for-13 in the regional. "I feel like everything is going our way. We can't wait to see what's next."
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.
