University of North Carolina Athletics
Lucas: The Stars Come Out
December 2, 2015 | Men's Basketball, Featured Writers, Adam Lucas
By Adam Lucas
I hate these late tips. Roy Williams says they are “ridiculous,” and he added some other words, but mostly all you need to know is that he is right. Because you sit around all day and wonder if this game is ever going to start and it doesn't, of course, because it's not the middle of the night yet, and they are ruining college sports with these, and…
It was amazing.
It was. There were 21,163 of us there, and one of them was Gary Williams, and one of them was world champion James Michael McAdoo, and one of them was world champion Harrison Barnes, and I have not even gotten to the part yet where J. Cole showed up (more on him in a second), but what you mostly need to know is that Marcus Paige was there.
In the locker room after Carolina's win over Kansas State, Paige and Brice Johnson were ribbing each other about Johnson's recent play. Paige told him he had to play better, and Johnson replied simply, “We're waiting on you.”
And we were. That—everything about that 89-81 win over No. 2 Maryland—was exactly what we were waiting for. We were waiting for the team-high 20 points and the team-high 34 minutes and the team-high five assists but really we were waiting for the things that don't show up anywhere in the box score.
Twelve minutes into the game, Paige forced a turnover and ran the break with Johnson. Things were all confused because Johnson was dribbling and Paige was under the basket and what else would you do if you were Paige but point for the rim as if you wanted a lob pass? And Johnson threw it, because it was Marcus Paige, and if he says he's going to dunk an alley-oop, you give him the ball. So Johnson threw it, and Paige caught it, and at that moment all 21,163 of us really believed Paige was going to keep elevating above the rim and slam it home, because he is Marcus Paige, but instead what he did was toss it back to Johnson for a two-handed slam.
“I could've dunked it,” Paige said after the game. “But y'all probably don't believe that.”
I believe it. Until proven otherwise, I believe everything he says, and you should, too.
Paige drew two charges in the game. One was on 6-foot-9, 235-pound Robert Carter, Jr. The other was the perfect Paige play, the moment that showed you exactly what Carolina gained when he was added to the starting lineup. With three minutes left and holding a nine-point lead, the Tar Heels turned it over and handed Maryland a 2-on-1 fast break. It was going to be an easy two points and they were going to have the momentum. It was one of the easiest scoring plays in basketball.
Except for Paige. Here is what he thought during the two seconds when Melo Trimble was sprinting down court with the dribble.
“I was the only one back,” he said. “I knew I had the option of contesting the layup, but I'm 6-foot-1, so I'm not going to block that shot. I was hoping Melo would keep running. Early in my career I would pass it and cut through and keep going, and I got a couple charges called on me that way when I was younger. So I figured I could either try to take the charge and give up a layup, or they were going to make a layup anyway. He was going to score either way. So I tried to step in front of him and hoped his momentum would carry him into me.”
He did all of that in two seconds. Maybe less. He processed all that information in less time than it took you to read his quotes about it. And Trimble was indeed called for the charge, the officials waved off the easy layup, and Paige had done exactly what Paige does.
Coming out of the subsequent timeout, Maryland star Rasheed Sulaimon sidled up to Paige. “You're an All-American, so you get that call,” he told him.
No. Look, Rasheed Sulaimon, we all know where you played before Maryland, so no one is doubting that you are an expert witness in the field of getting calls, but in this case you are wrong.
Paige gets that call because he goes to the right spot and does the right thing and thinks the game before anyone else on the court can play it. That's why he gets that call.
All in all, it had been a pretty full night for the Iowa native. Early in the game, he was trying to play defense against the Terps when a dead ball prompted a Carolina defensive huddle. Paige was exhorting Kennedy Meeks to fight through a screen when Meeks nudged him.
“Yo,” Meeks said, “J. Cole just walked in.”
So, yes, Marcus, Kennedy will fight through that screen, but did you know your favorite rapper—the guy whose music you play every day when you're shooting on your own—is sitting over there on the first row of section 126? This is the kind of thing that happens after dark at the Smith Center. World champions over here, platinum recording stars over here. Just another night.
At one point, Joel Berry hit a huge three-pointer to extend Carolina's lead to nine points, and Joel James went all the way down the Tar Heel bench high-fiving everyone until he reached the baseline, where McAdoo and Barnes were sitting—so he high-fived them, too.
Those moments are the ones that make all the waiting worth it. Earlier in the day, Paige was passing the time by writing a paper for his globalization class that is due Wednesday morning at 10 a.m. He sent his teammates a text: “Eight hours to go. I can't wait.”
Then he went back to writing his paper. This is how he described it: “It's on the decline of the nation-state and how that affects the global economy.”
Those UNC student-athletes, always looking for the shortcut, huh? All I know about Nation-State is they gave up 35 points to Larry Fedora in the first quarter on Saturday, so let's go back to talking about Marcus Paige being awesome at basketball. Late in the second half, Isaiah Hicks and Nate Britt miscommunicated on a screen on the ball defensively, and Britt eventually fouled a three-point shooter because of the miscue. While Maryland shot the free throw, Paige took the opportunity to calm Hicks, remind him how to play that set, and also encourage him to take the ball strong to the rim. That's what Carolina gains with Paige on the floor.
It is 12:45 a.m. and we could keep talking about him but it is late, you know, and there are lots of things to do—like write papers about globalization—and these late tips just ruin your night and we're all going to be sleepy tomorrow and…
And I am incredibly wired and don't know how anyone could sleep right now. Highlights, we need highlights. We need Jones Angell's call and Sean May filling in for Eric Montross on color and we need reaction shots and dunks and three-pointers and, well, we thought it would never get here and now we just want to relive it again.
Marcus Paige has to go write about globalization. I'm going to watch him play basketball again. It's never--never--too late for that.
