First Fan

Call him the First Fan.

President Barack Obama today welcomed the University of North Carolina Tar Heels basketball team to the White House to congratulate them on their recent national championship—which the president correctly predicted they would win.

Obama Welcomes UNC's National Champs to White House (WSJ Blogs - 11 May 2009)

It's never too late

More than 70 years after a girl and a job got in the way of Dillard Griffin's degree, the Durham County man will take part in the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill's commencement this weekend.

Griffin, 92, enrolled at UNC in 1934 and was on track to graduate four years later. Fate then intervened and led him in another direction.

[...]

Griffin never told his children that he hadn't graduated, even as he put them through college. When his daughter learned his secret last year, she enrolled him in a correspondence course.

Because he's legally blind, he had his coursework projected onto a screen to make it large enough for him to read. He said he got three A's and two B's on his assignments.

When he picks up his business degree on Sunday, he plans to wear a T-shirt under his cap and gown declaring him 1938 class president of the UNC Procrastinators' Club.

Rougemont man to get UNC degree 75 years after enrolling (WRAL.com)

Congratulations, Tarheels

Congratulations to the University of North Carolina Tarheels, 2009 NCAA Division I Men's Basketball Champions.

Game highlights will no doubt be on YouTube shortly.

Meanwhile, two advertising-related observations from the game:

(1) Although they broke a first-half scoring record (55 points), Carolina did not score more than 100 points in the game, meaning that it won't be two-sausage-biscuits-for-a-dollar day at Bojangles tomorrow (explanation here, sort of. It's definitely a Southern thing.)

(2) Here are college basketball coaching legends Roy Williams, Rick Pitino, Bobby Knight and Mike Krzyzewski in their underwear, pimping Guitar Hero Metallica:

Betting big on the Big Game

The mayors of Chapel Hill and Durham are betting big on Wednesday night’s game between UNC and Duke.

"If Duke loses, Chapel Hill Mayor Kevin Foy will receive tickets to a show at the Durham Performing Arts Center, the newly opened largest performing arts theater in the Carolinas,” according to a release from the mayor’s offices. “If UNC loses, Durham Mayor Bill Bell is invited to a night on Franklin Street and Asian cuisine at the Lantern Restaurant, which the News and Observer ranked as the 2008 No. 1 restaurant in the Triangle.”

But wait for this next part.

If UNC wins, Foy will supply Bell with a Carolina blue sweatshirt to wear at the next Durham City Council meeting. If Duke wins, Bell will give Foy a Duke blue sweatshirt to wear at the next Chapel Hill Town Council meeting.

The game is scheduled at 9 p.m. Wednesday at Duke’s Cameron Indoor Stadium.

Chapel Hill, Durham mayors place wager on Wednesday matchup (newsandobserver.com blogs: OrangeChat)

Feet of clay in expensive sneakers?

If you don't follow NCAA Division I college basketball, skip to the next post.

The University of North Carolina men's basketball team is usually a good one--historically, it's one of the strongest b-ball programs in the nation--but this year it looked like it was going to be exceptional. Unanimous pre-season Number 1 in the coaches' poll and held the top spot in the actual polls from the beginning of the season...

They went undefeated until the opening of ACC league play.

They're now 0-2 in the ACC, having lost to Boston College and Wake Forest. They are currently in last place in the ACC.

What happened?

What has happened to the former No. 1 team in the nation?

[...]

Last night's game against the Demon Deacons wasn't a surprise to me, as North Carolina was on the road, and Wake Forest was hungry to show they were as good as advertised. The game against Boston College was a shock, as I felt that the Tar Heels would play tougher and play smarter than in the previous three games, as this was their home and ACC opener.

Did Wayne Ellington and Ty Lawson really buy into the team concept Williams was preaching, or are they trying to prove to the scouts that they are NBA lottery picks? Where is the perimeter defense they both displayed early on in the season, and the good decision making?

UNC Basketball: What Is Going On In Chapel Hill? (Bleacher Report)

Hat tip: deVille

Psycho T, headed for the record books

Tyler Hansbrough didn’t seem fazed by all the questions about how close he is to breaking the career scoring record that has stood for 30 years at North Carolina. The prospect of giving a speech to the home fans to celebrate the moment, however, is another issue.

“I’m going to have to plan something,” Hansbrough said Wednesday. “It would be pretty bad if I didn’t get the record (with) with all this anticipation.”

Standing nine points away from passing Phil Ford, the senior is likely to set the mark when the top-ranked Tar Heels face Evansville on Thursday night considering he has failed to score in double figures just six times in his career. It would be the latest accomplishment in a career filled with them for the reigning national player of the year, who has already earned the right to have his No. 50 jersey retired when he graduates.

Ford set the record with 2,290 points in 1978. The record has stood despite notable names like Michael Jordan, James Worthy and Antawn Jamison coming through the program in the years since, though Jordan, Jamison and Rashad McCants would have been within reach had they not left school a year early for the NBA.

Hansbrough on cusp of setting UNC scoring record (AP Sports News via Rivals.com)

Yeah, sounds like something a bunch of engineers would come up with

Last season, the drawings for the 3,500 student tickets [for N.C. State Wolfpack men's basketball games] in the RBC Center were random. Student surveys showed, however, that the students wanted a way to reward passionate fans and give upperclassmen a better shot at the tickets.

Now, a point system is in place. Seniors and graduate students start with five points, juniors four, sophomores three and freshmen two. Students get an additional point each time they attend a game.

So a senior who attends every game is at the top of the priority list – and first in line for midcourt seats – against rivals like North Carolina and Duke.

"If you are a senior or junior and you attend all the [non-conference] games, there is a great chance you will be sitting mid-court for ACC games, instead of having to watch at home because you missed out on the lottery," Student Body President Jay Dawkins said in a statement.

WRALSportsFan.com: New N.C. State student ticket policy rewards passionate basketball fans

I wonder how they'll measure game attendance? Still, this sounds like an idea worth trying. One of the big perks of going to college at UNC were the student tickets to basketball games, and I attended quite a few.

Now that I've graduated (cough, cough) the price to get in line to buy season tickets for UNC basketball games is $5,000 per year (ticket prices not included)... and the price to be sure is closer to $15,000 per year.

Virtually all of the games are on TV. :-)

Up in Indiana where the tall corn grows

They know a little something about college basketball in Indiana:

Quinn Buckner laughed as soon as he heard the premise of the question.

"It's way too early to be talking about this," said Buckner, one of the stars of college basketball's last unbeaten national champion, Indiana's 1975-76 team that went 32-0.

The topic was North Carolina and whether the Tar Heels can replace the Hoosiers as the most recent unblemished champion.

North Carolina was the first unanimous preseason No. 1 team in The Associated Press poll, fueling the chatter that has existed since several key Heels spurned the NBA draft and returned to Chapel Hill.

They return all five starters, including national Player of the Year Tyler Hansbrough, and key reserves from a team that went 36-3 and reached the Final Four. Additionally, they add one of the nation's highest-rated recruiting classes, including 7-foot McDonald's All-American Tyler Zeller from Washington, Ind.

All pieces in place for No. 1 North Carolina to chase perfection (Indianapolis Star, 9 November 2008)

If it hasn't made the news in Indianapolis yet, it will soon: Tyler Hansbrough is out for an undetermined time with a "stress reaction condition" (the precursor to a stress fracture, one imagines?) in his shin.

Hansbrough's absence didn't deter the Tar Heels in their first outing against... uh... UNC-Pembroke.

We're not in Kansas anymore

The NCAA men's basketball semifinal game between UNC and Kansas was not the nailbiter that I expected. More's the pity.

UNC collapsed comprehensively in the first half, going into the locker room, unbelievably, almost thirty points down...and though they whittled the Kansas lead to four points briefly in the second half, Kansas led and essentially remained in control for the entire game.

The outcome was never really in doubt.

UNC had a great year. The played a very nearly perfect season and were dominant throughout the tourney.

I had been really looking forward to last night's game, because I expected that it would be the first time the Heels would really be challenged in the tournament.

Be careful what you wish for, I reckon. :-)

The next big news out of Carolina basketball is likely to be Tyler Hansbrough's decision about whether to turn pro.