Lucas: How Family Happens

By Adam Lucas

I want to show you how the Carolina Family happens.

It was not created in a marketing meeting. It was not picked because it sounds good in a hashtag. It's not part of a recruiting push.

It's just the way things are done around here. The Carolina Family was a way of life before the word hashtag was even invented. That's why it seems authentic, because no one in Chapel Hill is actively trying to create it. It exists. Those who are Tar Heels understand it. That is how it works.

The Carolina Family is real because it is tightest when the spotlight is off. Like in a darkened corner of the home tunnel at the Smith Center on Tuesday night, when the most Carolina storyline of them all happened away from the cameras--except for the watchful eye of Maggie Hobson, who captured the image you see above. There is so much history in that picture, so much love, so much Carolina.

Hubert Davis was about to walk on the court for the most pressure-filled day of his working life. The person who met him was Linda Woods, who you and I know as Mrs. Woods, but who Davis knows very simply as Mama Woods.

Woods worked in the basketball office for decades. She assisted Dean Smith with correspondence, she talked on the phone, she did pretty much everything except for make the carrot cake (Lillian Lee legendarily handled that).

A teenage Hubert Davis probably noticed some of those responsibilities. But what he noticed the most was that she cared. She asked how he was doing and then she listened. She knew what he liked to eat. She wouldn't let him walk through the office without a hug.

You're going to learn more about Davis in the weeks and months and years to come. You're going to learn that he keeps a tight circle, that he treasures the memory of his mother, who died when he was in high school, that he is passionate about his faith and his family and Carolina.

You will learn that he is the kind of father whose college student son, Elijah, thought nothing of driving from Virginia to Chapel Hill on a Tuesday night just to be there when his dad walked off the court after his first game. The head coach almost missed Elijah on his way to the locker room after the win, and when he finally saw him, the two embraced in the kind of hug that is usually reserved for airports or college dorm parking lots on move-in day.

By the time he reached his players in the locker room, tears were rolling down Davis' cheeks. It had overwhelmed him to see his wife, Leslie, and his kids, and his father. This is a man who cares and doesn't mind you knowing that he cares.

Which makes him a very nice fit for Carolina. Davis learned to care from his parents, of course. But he also saw it modeled in Chapel Hill, under the watchful eye of Dean Smith and, yes, Linda Woods. You're going to learn that it mattered that just before Hubert Davis walked out on that court, he wanted to see Mama Woods.

She has been through multiple chemotherapy treatments. She might not move quite as fast as she used to when she kept the Carolina basketball office running flawlessly. But she was there on Tuesday, when one of her boys needed her.

I am going to tell you the secret to the Carolina Family, and this is why it hasn't yet been reproduced. Everyone thinks you do it with flashy graphics or slick videos. Nope. The secret, folks, is caring. It's Coby White hugging Roy Williams on an NBA court in Chicago. It's Marvin Williams flying to Europe to watch one of Deon Thompson's games. It's the handwritten "P.S." at the bottom of every one of Dean Smith's letters, just to let you know it wasn't a form letter and he actually took the time to think about you. It's Linda Woods and Hubert Davis, in a tight embrace, moments before Davis officially becomes one of the most important figures in the history of Carolina Basketball.

Caring is the easiest thing and the hardest thing all at once. And it's the Carolina Family.

"At a time when I needed a mom, she was my mom," the new head coach said. "She would fix me lunch, and she took care of me. I called her Mama Woods. I asked her to be there tonight. That was important to me. And having her there also reminded me of Coach Smith."

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