University of North Carolina Athletics
Lucas: Setting Up The Circus
October 13, 2011 | Men's Basketball, Featured Writers, Adam Lucas
Oct. 13, 2011
By Adam Lucas
On Thursday afternoon at the Smith Center, six basketball employees stood in the lobby of the basketball office, with three of them simultaneously on the phone. Three dozen signed basketballs sat on the floor waiting for FedEx pickup, part of a batch of hundreds that had been team-signed for charity and sold out on the first day orders were received. Those orders were driven in part by high expectations; CBSSports.com issued its preseason poll earlier in the day, pegging the Tar Heels number-one in the country, the same spot they are expected to occupy when the traditional weekly polls are released.
One flight of steps down from the office, setup was underway for Late Night with Roy Williams, which will be covered nationwide by ESPN3 beginning at 7:30 tomorrow. When ESPNU goes live at 9 p.m., Carolina will be one of the schools featured. Inside the media room, dozens of reporters assembled for what turned into a standing room-only version of Roy Williams's annual preseason news conference. Just one hour earlier, President Barack Obama's office had confirmed the President would be attending Carolina's season opener against Michigan State, a game that will be played on an active aircraft carrier and will, of course, be televised nationwide.
In other words, everything was normal in Chapel Hill.
With Thursday afternoon's media day (catch up on the major storylines here), basketball is officially back. Those who need tangible proof will get it sometime Friday morning, when the first diehard camps outside the Smith Center waiting for plum seats to Late Night with Roy Williams.
We may take this for granted, just a little bit, in Chapel Hill. Of the ten biggest games in college basketball this season, at least four of them--Michigan State, Kentucky, and two battles with Duke--will involve the Tar Heels.
Well, of course. It's Carolina Basketball.
Players are bedazzled by all things Carolina on recruiting visits and then become accustomed to it by the time they're upperclassmen.
"It's tremendous to be a part of it," said Tyler Zeller. "We play against professional players and past players every day in the summer. Not only have you met them, you've played against them.
"We had someone here last weekend. He saw Rasheed Wallace and he was like, `Whoa, that's Rasheed Wallace!' Yeah, it is. We play against him all the time."
Zeller managed to say this without sounding the least bit obnoxious, which is a gift. Especially considering he wakes up every day and lives college basketball's version of the Beatles. On this particular stage, in this particular year, they are royalty. When they play at home, grown-ups will wait outside the Smith Center after the game--no matter what the hour--for a chance at securing an autograph or a quick photo. On Twitter, fans beg to be retweeted by the players, for no other reason than to say they, too, touched a rock star, even if it was in cyberspace.
Get too close to it and you lose perspective on how big it is, sort of a reverse-Neil Fingleton phenomenon. For five months, from November to March (and hopefully into April), there are people everywhere who will schedule their lives and lose sleep over the ability of college students to put a ball in a hoop. At some point in the next half a year, it's guaranteed that at some point it will feel like there is no more important issue in my life than the minutes being played by Kendall Marshall.
It is a sickness. Isn't it great?
When names like Harrison Barnes and John Henson are announced tomorrow night at the Smith Center, before a basket is made or an assist is recorded, a capacity crowd of 20,000 people will roar. Lasers will fire and national ESPN personality Stuart Scott will be there and the one-night equivalent of a Broadway show will motor along.
This is considered normal in Chapel Hill.
It will be especially pronounced this season, when the Tar Heels possess the dual threat of star power (Barnes, who will have plenty of magazine cover appearances to sign every single time he comes out of any tunnel in any arena) and expectations. Fans and/or eBay dealers, usually both, will wait in lobbies of hotels.
Marshall has long since become used to walking across campus and having discussions with people he has never seen before and will never see again. These people will almost always know things about him he doesn't realize they know, whether it's from following him on Twitter or reading a story about him.
"It really is incredible," he said. "You get used to it, but when you stop and think about it, it's really kind of crazy."
It's not crazy. It's just Carolina Basketball. Welcome to the 2011-12 season.
Adam Lucas is the publisher of Tar Heel Monthly. He is also the author or co-author of six books on Carolina basketball, including the official chronicle of the first 100 years of Tar Heel hoops, A Century of Excellence, which is available now. Get real-time UNC sports updates from the THM staff on Twitter and Facebook.
