University of North Carolina Athletics
Lucas: 102 Steps
March 25, 2007 | Men's Basketball
March 25, 2007
By Adam Lucas
EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J.--This hallway is much too long.
And this hallway is much too short.
This hallway is a back corridor of the Meadowlands in New Jersey, which opened in 1981 but seems much older. NCAA Tournament postgames work this way: the head coach and two players answer questions at the podium in front of the assembled media. Some media never leave the podium area. Others make the walk down the hall to the locker room to get quotes from players not called to the podium.
After Sunday's loss--really, "loss" doesn't do it justice, does it?--you stop at the podium area first. Mostly, in truth, just to have a place to sit. You sat at courtside for as long as you could, watching Roy Hibbert grin and Jeff Green point to the "Georgetown" on the front of his jersey and every Hoya wearing dark blue get a hug from John Thompson Sr.
It is hard to believe. With what seemed like just moments left in the second half, you looked at the clock and it still said 7 minutes and 51 seconds remained. Was this clock ever moving? It was going...so...slow. So close to the Final Four but not wanting to think about it but you couldn't help letting it creep into your brain and then you shooed it away before anyone could notice.
Then the clock rushed. It cascaded. It snowballed. Then shots weren't falling and three-pointers were being jacked up and a 10-point lead was gone, just like that. Some will say Carolina couldn't stop Georgetown in overtime. That's not true. Carolina couldn't stop them beginning at tipoff. The Hoyas shot 59.4% in the first half, 55.6% in the second half, and 57.1% in overtime.
Ugh.
Which brings us to this hallway. You can only sit in the podium area for so long without wondering what's happening in the locker room. People pay thousands of dollars for the privilege of getting one sneak peek into the Tar Heel locker room. And right now, there's nowhere less appealing.
The NCAA brings the same blue carpet to every tournament venue. It was the same in Winston-Salem and the same in East Rutherford and it'll be the same in Atlanta, not that you care enough to watch and find out.
Right now, you're staring down at that carpet and pondering a long walk to the locker room. This is the exact definition of "trudging." Just get in there, get the feel of the room, and get out. Don't linger. Keep your head down between here and there. No eye contact. Maybe it'll be deserted back here.
Thirty-eight steps later, here comes Joe Holladay. He's got a Midwestern sense of humor that is delightful. Right now, there are very few people you want to see less. It is nothing against him. It's just that, well, right now there is not much to say. Any suggestions? "Good game, Coach," doesn't seem appropriate. "Sorry" doesn't either. The answer to, "How are you doing?" is obvious.
So you look up, give a little shake of your head, and pat him on the back. He doesn't say anything. There is nothing to say.
Eighteen steps later, here is the Georgetown band. They are hollering and high-fiving.
Twenty steps later, C.B. McGrath and Jerod Haase are standing against a wall. College roommates, fast friends, their wives even gave birth within a couple months of each other. It is almost impossible to be in a room with them and not hear words bouncing off the walls, the rapid-fire easy chatter of best friends.
They're not saying anything now. They're just standing there, looking down at this blue carpet.
Five steps later, you go around a corner and come upon some very tall individuals. It's every single Georgetown player, and they're laughing and hopping to their locker room. Hibbert has a piece of net stuck behind his ear. They're wearing championship t-shirts. Somewhere, there is a box of Carolina championship t-shirts. Probably, someone moved them closer to the court with 6 minutes left. That way they'd be closer to the court for the celebration. Now we'll never see them.
The Georgetown band spots the players and merriment ensues. It is festive. It is joyous. And it sounds exactly like fingernails on a chalkboard.
Twenty-one more steps, and you're in the locker room. This is, without question, a losing locker room. Some years there is a chance to prepare. You know it's coming. This year, it felt like things were just falling into place. It still felt that way less than an hour ago.
Now there are hotel room keys tossed on the floor. Dewey Burke is in full uniform, just sitting there. It's quiet, strangely quiet considering how many individuals are crammed into this space. Players answer questions in hushed tones, and there is none of the usual back-and-forth between players as they get dressed.
Something is out of place: it's the jerseys. Usually, they're tossed in the laundry to be washed for the next game. Now there is no next game. So Danny Green's familiar number-14, still blindingly white, is hung on a peg behind him. Surry Wood's is folded neatly on top of his travel bag. It's hard to explain why this is so jarring. It's the official confirmation that there's nothing left in this season. These jerseys won't be needed again.
That's the most striking sight. To Green's left, in another part of the room, is the most striking sound. It sounds like this: sniff clickclickclickclick.
It's Tyler Hansbrough, and he's trying not to cry but the tears are coming. This is like chum in the water for photographers, who press their lenses right up to his face to get the shot. One photographer goes high, the other crouches down and shoots the sitting Hansbrough from below. For effect, you know. My words aren't good enough to explain how uncomfortable this should be, intruding on a moment like this. These particular individuals--not photographers as a whole, but these individuals--don't seem bothered by it.
There are a total of 102 steps between the podium area and the locker room. That sounds like it's a lot, but it's not enough.
People wonder why Roy Williams cries at the end of almost every season. Looking around this room, it's completely obvious. This room is broken. Every single team except one ends the season this way. At this particular moment, the BCS sounds like a good idea in college basketball...except that you know how good it feels to be that one team that ends the season with a win. That's what keeps you playing. That's what keeps you dreaming. That's what will get most of these players back in the gym later this week.
Like Wayne Ellington. He knows the magnitude of the shot he missed at the end of regulation. He's taken it thousands of times in his driveway and thousands of times in practice. Even took it a handful of times at the end of high school games.
"Most of them went in," he says, and he shrugs a little.
This one didn't. Now he has to figure out what to do next.
"I want to get some rest, but I want to get back in the gym," he says. "You're so upset that you want to work on things. It depends on how I feel physically, but I'm ready to get back to it."
It took 102 steps to get here.
The first step of 2008 is on the other side of the locker room door.
Adam Lucas's third book on Carolina basketball, The Best Game Ever, chronicles the 1957 national championship season and is available now. His previous books include Going Home Again, focusing on Roy Williams's return to Carolina, and Led By Their Dreams, a collaboration with Steve Kirschner and Matt Bowers on the 2005 championship team.
