University of North Carolina Athletics
Lucas: The Count
June 11, 2007 | Baseball
June 11, 2007
By Adam Lucas
"Don't count outs."
That's what Mike Fox told his team when they gathered Friday night along the Boshamer Stadium third-base line. His Tar Heels had just taken a 1-0 lead in the best-of-three super-regional against South Carolina, but he wanted to issue a quick warning before he sent them home for the night.
It seemed like a simple order. His message was obvious: there's still one game left to win. Don't fall into the same trap that bit the Tar Heels in Omaha last year, when they secured a 1-0 lead over Oregon State in the national championship series and held a 5-0 lead in the second game before disaster struck. On that night, several of the Diamond Heels admitted they had started to cipher how many outs remained until a national title.
Eighteen more...
This time, it was not a national championship at stake. It was a return trip to the College World Series, and it was a monumental task. Last season, the postseason run was more of a, "Gee, this is fun," kind of magical ride. There was no time to think about what might happen next or what the implications were or what kind of meaning the whole thing had. Just win, win, win. There was no time to count outs...until suddenly the whole thing became a little too overwhelming.
This year, everyone knew. Most players on the current roster who returned from 2006 would tell you they thought about what happened in Omaha every day for the past year. That feeling made it that much tougher.
Last year, the Tar Heels wanted to make it to Omaha to see what it was like.
This year, the Tar Heels wanted to make it to Omaha because they already knew what it was like.
It's a week or more of being treated like royalty. It's milkshakes at Zesto's and a whiskey filet at the Drover and a triple Kong burger after midnight. It's the big Epcot-looking dome at the zoo. It's tailgating--lots of tailgating. It's Nebraska fans who show up in red-shirted droves even though the Cornhuskers aren't playing. It's an 8-page pullout section every day in the local paper and the lead story on every local newscast. It's 20,000 fans in the stands. It's big-time...with just the right dose of small-town.
"It's the most fun I've ever had at a sporting event," Roy Williams told a collection of Tar Heels in the dugout 45 minutes before the start of game 3.
Now do you understand? The Tar Heels had to play the last two weeks knowing exactly what they'd miss if they didn't earn a return trip to the College World Series.
That sounds absurd, of course. Back-to-back trips to Omaha? That is what Rice or Fullerton does. You know, baseball schools.
Wait a minute. Maybe that's exactly right. What else would you call the back-to-back ACC Coastal Division champions, the ACC Tournament champions, and the back-to-back College World Series participants?
Well, you could call them stressful. Their last four victories, including Sunday's that turned the lights out at old Boshamer for the last time, have been come-from-behind epics.
"I'm losing years off my life," said reliever Rob Wooten, and if he thinks it's hard pitching--his veering slider is one of the major reasons why the Tar Heels are still playing--he should try just having to sit there and watch them.
Before Sunday night's game, as he talked about the potential outcome, Fox didn't talk about trophies or television exposure or the benefit to recruiting. He talked about one thing: "Getting to see the faces on the kids when they win a big game like this is priceless," he said.
It's OK to doubt him. Right up until you stand in that dugout after the game and watch every player unpile after the 9-4 win and you look--really look--at their faces. There are pound-you-on-the-back-until-it-hurts hugs and there are goofy smiles and there is shaving cream in Chad Flack's face and Gatorade all over Fox and families on the field and pictures and parents scooping up dirt off the pitcher's mound and...
And you know what? You can't help but think that Fox is exactly right.
"I can't explain my emotions right now," Wooten said. "It's by far the best feeling I've ever had in sports. By far."
Go back to just before the game. Go back to Williams talking to a handful of players in the dugout.
"What would you have said before the season if someone had told you that you could play one game to go to Omaha, and you'd get to play it right here at Boshamer Stadium?" the basketball head coach said.
Chad Flack's eyes widened.
"I'd say that would be great!" he said.
Count on that.
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.
