University of North Carolina Athletics
Lucas: More Than Four
February 21, 2015 | Men's Basketball, Featured Writers, Adam Lucas
By Adam Lucas
Marcus Paige has run game-winning plays in hostile arenas. Just three days ago, he had the ball in his hands with a chance to sink a buzzer-beater at Duke's Cameron Indoor Stadium. Already this year, he's vanquished Louisville with a last-second shot, and he sent NC State home angry last season.
And despite all that, Paige was unequivocal about one particular play in Saturday's game against Georgia Tech. “I don't think I've ever been that nervous to execute a play,” Paige said
It wasn't a game-winning play. It wasn't even a second-half play. It was just the first offensive play of the game for the Tar Heels against a sub-.500 Yellow Jacket squad, a game Carolina would eventually win by 29 points.
But to Paige, it was more than that, because his head coach had entrusted him to run the Four Corners one more time.
“It's something I've been thinking about for two weeks,” Roy Williams said. “It was some way to do something that would mean a great deal to him and mean a great deal to me.”
So Paige circled out near midcourt and held up four fingers, just as Williams and everyone on the Carolina bench did the same.
Understand this: on Saturday, it was a tribute. But that same image—the Carolina point guard with the ball, holding up four fingers, dribbling away precious seconds—used to send shivers down the entire rest of the Atlantic Coast Conference. Phil Ford or Jimmy Black or Kenny Smith would put up four fingers, and every person in Carmichael would roar, and the game was not even a game anymore, because the game was over, and pretty soon the band would be playing Carolina Victory, because in those days the song was played during the game as soon as the victory was apparent, and then Carmichael would go crazy again.
Even Paige, who wasn't born until long after college basketball had enacted a shot clock, knew the history behind what he was doing: “Phil Ford was unstoppable as the ballhandler in the middle,” he said, with more basketball savvy than a 21-year-old should have. Paige was the perfect player to run the offense. Last week at Pitt, he actually cited Carolina's first half loss of ball percentage--a favorite Smith stat--as a gauge of where the Tar Heels needed to improve. Who else would do that? Paige not only grasps how to run a specific play, he understands why and how it works and why it matters.
The Four Corners effect was enhanced by Saturday's throwback uniforms, that familiar North Carolina on the chest and the Tar Heel foot on the shorts. Squint just a little, and Paige could have been Ford or Black or The Jet.
Dean Smith could melt minutes at a time off the clock with the Four Corners. Paige didn't need minutes. He only needed about ten seconds, and then Brice Johnson cut down the baseline to receive a pass, scoring Carolina's first two points.
UNC in 4 corners to honor Dean Smith pic.twitter.com/Q6a2CdbXFB
— Spencer Herlong (@TarHeelPhoto) February 21, 2015
On the bench, Roy Williams gulped in one big breath, then slowly blew it out as he took a seat next to his assistant coaches. Longtime observers of the head coach know that's very much his tell—it's almost always his reaction when he's trying to keep emotion from welling up in a big moment, and it's exactly what he also did during Saturday's pregame moment of silence for Smith.
It likely would have made him even more emotional to look up in the Smith Center stands behind the student risers, where dozens of Carolina basketball lettermen in town for this weekend's Smith celebration were seated. As the Tar Heels ran back on defense, a couple of the alums couldn't help themselves—they simply had to point to Paige, recognizing him for the pass, just as they learned from Smith 20 or 30 or in some cases even 40 years ago.
Smith would have loved the crisp execution on the Four Corners, and would have loved even more to see his pupils recognizing the passer. But maybe his favorite moment of the day would have come outside the building that bears his name, over a half-hour after the Tar Heels had finished off the 89-60 victory.
As security personnel cleaned up the traffic cones and directed the final stragglers back towards the interstate, three gentlemen ambled down the sidewalk towards the parking lot. They were taking their time, and they were laughing, and occasionally they would slap each other on the back.
It was J.R. Reid, Dave Popson, and Jeff Denny. They were teammates on the fantastic 1986-87 Carolina squad, a terrific group that is on the short list as one of the best Carolina teams not to win a national title.
And here they were, over 25 years later, just a kid from Virginia Beach, a kid from Rural Hall, and a kid from Kingston, Pa., somehow brought together by one legendary coach from Emporia, Kansas. They werne't kids anymore, although maybe today they felt like it, and now they were back to pay tribute to him. All the memories were coming back, and they were relishing the chance to relive them, just a few brothers swapping stories. Something about this place--and something about these people--had united these three very different individuals, and a quarter of a century later their relationship was still unbroken.
The afternoon had begun, perhaps, exactly the way Smith would have wanted. And as they walked out, they made sure it was ending that way, too.
