University of North Carolina Athletics
CAROLINA: Celebration Of A Championship
February 5, 2014 | Women's Basketball
Sylvia Crawley remembers the moment in the spring of 1994 that she knew her team was capable of winning the national championship. It was in the locker room in Rock Hill, South Carolina, site of the ACC Tournament, just before the conference title game. The Tar Heels stood at 26-2 on the year, with their only two losses coming at the hands of the Virginia Cavaliers. Seeded second in the tournament, the Tar Heels would have to get past those same Cavaliers for the ACC crown.
"We knew if we beat Virginia, nothing else could stop us," Crawley remembered at Sunday's team reunion. Tar Heel head coach Sylvia Hatchell gave a fiery pregame speech just before the team took the court. The players prepared to say their team chant when Crawley noticed a tear running down the face of freshman point guard Marion Jones. "I said, 'Marion, are you sick? Do you need a trainer? Not today! We've got to have a perfect game.' And she said, 'I'm OK. I just want to win,'" Crawley said. "She was a freshman and I was a senior, and I thought to myself, she wants to win so bad it hurts." One player after another sat down near Jones, sharing in the emotional pregame moment.
Jones doesn't remember exactly what Coach Hatchell said during that speech, but it was the weight of the moment, the beginning of a 'new' season, a chance at redemption and the potential of a championship that overwhelmed her. "Because I was the point guard, I was the leader, I wanted the team to see how much it meant," she said. "I know everybody felt it in their hearts, but they needed to see it."
Moments later, the Tar Heels took their emotion to the court. "Our entire team played in a zone," Crawley said. "Usually, (Tonya) Sampson was in a zone, or Charlotte (Smith) was in a zone and we'd pass the ball to her. This was the only time in my 23 years of playing basketball when an entire team was in a zone. We shot off-balance shots on one foot, and they went in. And we could feel it." After the tears, the Tar Heels tore through the Cavaliers for a 17-point win. They would not lose again.
On Sunday, the 1994 NCAA championship team was honored at halftime of the Tar Heels' game against Miami. They spent the weekend together, sharing adjacent rooms at the Hampton Inn, opening up the doors and laughing together-like a road trip, Tonya Sampson said. They held a reception Saturday night and shared Tar Heel memories.
Just before the team took the floor at halftime Sunday, Marion Jones bounced up and down on the balls of her feet-not in the basketball shoes she would have worn in 1994-but bouncing nonetheless. "I did!" she said. "I was like, 'OK, no, we're not going to play, but we were kind of in that area where we would get together (to run onto the court). It's a really good feeling being back."
After the ceremony, after Sylvia Hatchell had saluted her championship team and told of their going from last place in the ACC in 1991 to the national title, the champions stopped in the corner of Carmichael Arena to welcome the 2014 Tar Heels back for the second half. The older sisters high-fived their young successors in Carolina blue.
"It's important for them to know that we're there," Sampson said. "We had our time. This is their time. We had to let them know that we're going to support them every year, no matter what, win or lose."
