University of North Carolina Athletics
Lucas: Center Court
March 1, 2016 | Men's Basketball, Featured Writers, Adam Lucas
By Adam Lucas
Senior days get sadder as we get older.
That's what I decided on Monday night, as a six-person Carolina senior class that includes Marcus Paige and Brice Johnson played their last game in the Smith Center.
Really, that's it. They're done. Paige is never running out of that tunnel wearing a Carolina jersey again. Ever.
That doesn't seem possible. Over the last four years, they've played 65 games in the building. Sometimes they've been exhilarating, sometimes they've been heart-breaking, and sometimes they've simply been forgettable. But it's always seemed that they would just keep going on indefinitely, that if this one didn't work out, there would be another one in a few days.
Now there isn't another one. The Tar Heels beat Syracuse, 75-70. Somewhere, there is a place you can read about the win. This isn't it. This is about what happened after the game, about Joel James, Johnson and Paige taking the microphone at center court and leading a Tar Heel basketball revival, and then Roy Williams finishing it off with a very rare senior day speech that included calling the 2016 Tar Heels “one of my favorite teams ever.”
Ever since Williams returned to Chapel Hill, he's espoused the value of a really good Senior Day. The Tar Heels have had really good players on Senior Day. They've had really good wins on Senior Day.
But this? This, finally, was a really, really good Senior Day. Only a very small part was due to the win. A much larger part was due to the people, to the emotions they very clearly felt for each other, and for the way they expressed those emotions even with thousands of people listening.
We all have our memories of our favorite Tar Heel players. Most of you know that my younger son, Asher, “works” as a Carolina ballboy. Four years ago, he was devastated when Kendall Marshall left. Marshall was incredibly kind to him, and I was afraid Asher's love for Carolina basketball might be Marshall-centric. I wasn't sure how he would cope without his favorite point guard.
“Don't worry,” director of player relations Eric Hoots told me during that summer of 2012. “There's another one coming who is exactly that same kind of guy.”
That next one, of course, was left-handed and wore number-5, just like Marshall. That next one was Paige. After the first exhibition game, I asked Asher about the new team. Was there anyone in particular he liked?
“I like Marcus,” he said. “He was really nice to me.”
The next season, the Tar Heels went on a trip to the Basketball Hall of Fame in advance of games against Richmond and Louisville in Uncasville, Conn. It was an after-hours tour, and the team was the only one in the Hall of Fame. At one point, I lost track of Asher.
I later discovered him shooting baskets on the portable Hall of Fame goals with Johnson, who was wearing a full suit and tie while bodying up Asher in the post. They are regular foes before home games, where Johnson indulges Asher's sometimes too-physical defense. Or, I guess, they were regular foes between home games. That's over now, but I don't want it to be.
Before Monday's game, I took a minute to sit courtside and watch the seniors interact with my son, who doesn't even realize he's making memories he will never forget. Paige--who met the media after the game wearing a t-shirt featuring a picture of the Old Well--nailed a three-pointer over his outstretched arms. Johnson tantalized him by dribbling over, through and around him. After the national anthem, Johnson gave Asher a quick fist pound, as he has done before every home game for the last four years.
I understand how this works. I know there are more Tar Heels coming, and that we are going to love them, too. It's just that there will never be another class from this particular time, who we associate with these particular moments in our lives. We will never get to see them again here, like this.
When he addressed the crowd after the game, Paige spoke of making a point to write down all of Williams' Thoughts for the Day that are at the top of every day's practice plan. “I know there will be a time,” Paige said through tears, “that I won't be able to run through that tunnel, so I've been taking notes.”
My younger daughter, McKay, audibly let out an “Awwww.” “My Marcus is growing up,” she said.
It was funny to hear coming from a 12-year-old, but she was right. My Marcus is growing up. I'm not ready for him to do that. I'm not ready for any of us to do that. By the time he was done, Paige was crying, his parents were crying, his girlfriend was crying, and I was dealing with some serious dust issues in the Smith Center ventilation system.
“It's like an interactive experience,” Paige said of taking the microphone at center court at the Smith Center after the game. “It's not like you're in an auditorium. You can feel the love in the crowd. The true fans stick around, and they care. I saw a little girl bawling when Brice was speaking. I thought about how he's touched her life in these moments as a Carolina basketball player. You lose sight of that sometimes in the thick of trying to win an ACC title.”
I've loved every second of the basketball. Well, most every second of the basketball. There have been buzzer-beaters and blowouts and they all seemed incredibly important at the time they were happening. You won't believe this right now, but eventually we won't remember exactly who made the big plays late in the big wins, or missed those shots late in the painful losses. But we will never, ever forget what it was like to watch James, Johnson and Paige stand in the middle of that blue outline of the state of North Carolina, and talk about how the Carolina basketball program changed their lives.
This isn't over, not yet, and I hope it lasts for another six weeks. But right now, right this second, I miss them.
