ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, March 26, 1997 TAG: 9703260037
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: JACK BOGACZYK
SOURCE: JACK BOGACZYK
There have been strange things happenings on the road to the Final Four.
First, there was an NCAA victory by a coach nicknamed ``Fang.'' Ron Mitchell guided Coppin State past South Carolina, the seismic bracket-buster. There also was what occurred Sunday at the Carrier Dome, in a confined, usually quiet, space.
That would be a North Carolina huddle during a timeout. With 7:38 remaining in the East Regional final and Louisville trailing the Tar Heels only 72-66, Dean Smith was taking three minutes of CBS time to educate his team.
The attentive Heels, their 21-point halftime lead having been chopped to almost nothing, were waiting for some guidance from the Dean of coaches on how to get to Indianapolis this weekend, when Smith said, ``Well, they could catch up and win. Maybe it's supposed to end here. But we've had a great season.''
Startlingly, a moment of silence was broken by someone facing Smith. Ademola Okulaja, in a bold move for a sophomore, did something no Tar Heel had ever done in a game huddle with Smith before.
He screamed.
Not with words, but like, open wide, and say ``AHHHHHH!'' - at the top of your lungs.
Everyone looked at Smith. Assistant coach Bill Guthridge, Okulaja said, took a step toward him, as if to scold the interruption. Then, Okulaja's classmate, guard Vince Carter, summed up the moment.
``Wow,'' Carter said aloud.
Smith went back to business, and so did the Tar Heels, who went on to win by 23.
``No one ever talks in the huddle, until Coach Smith is done talking,'' guard Shammond Williams said. ``I think we were all waiting to see what happened.''
What happened is what Smith wanted to happen, although it's unlikely he expected such a demonstrative demonstration by the Berlin-born forward.
``I was mad,'' Okulaja said later. ``I thought, `Oh, no,' after I did it, but it was kind of like an insult, the way Coach Smith said it. Like it was over. It wasn't.''
Later, after his 879th victory, Smith confirmed what Okulaja said was true. Of course it was. However, as he also said, ``They got mad at me, [but] sometimes you need to confront things before you can do something about it.''
North Carolina scored 19 of the next 22 points. It was another happening that has stamped this UNC team as one of the most unique in Smith's 36 Chapel Hill seasons.
Another was the players-only meeting that lasted for more than an hour in the visitors' locker room at University Hall in mid-January after Virginia blistered the Heels, who had fallen to an 0-3 start in league play for the first time in school - not ACC - history, dating to the 1920s in the Southern Conference.
``That was do or die,'' center Serge Zwikker said. There wasn't any screaming that day, only what Williams labeled ``constructive criticism'' at the beginning of the session.
So, the Heels head to the Final Four as the 26th team from their state to reach the national semifinals in the past 36 years. They have as good a shot as anyone in this particular season. If there's something we've learned in the past four months, it is that there might not be a dominant team in college hoops. Or, if there were, it went home to Kansas last week.
``If you lose, the whole season is over,'' said Zwikker, the 7-foot-3 Dutchman who is going to his third Final Four with the Heels. ``We don't have as much talent as the [NCAA champion] 1993 team [on which Roanoke's George Lynch was the lone senior regular, as Zwikker is this season], but this team has a work ethic that's better.
``Just getting this far means you've accomplished a lot, but now that you're here, your goal is to win the NCAA title.''
If that happens, more of the Heels than Okulaja will be screaming.
LENGTH: Medium: 74 lines KEYWORDS: BASKETBALLby CNB