DATE: Monday, March 10, 1997                TAG: 9703100157

SECTION: SPORTS                  PAGE: C1   EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: Column 

SOURCE: Tom Robinson 

                                            LENGTH:   70 lines

THE ONCE 0-3 TAR HEELS GET LAST LAUGH AT ACC'S PARTY

GREENSBORO - The team that couldn't win is now the team that can't lose. So praise the North Carolina Tar Heels and pass the NCAA tournament bracket because they're back - seeded No. 1 and maybe as good as any college team in the country.

Not very long ago they were tied for the worst team in the ACC, remember that? Who could forget? North Carolina's 0-3 start in the conference season was trumpeted near and far, thoroughly savored by Tar Heel haters and sweated over by nervous-Nellie loyalists who measure their days by coach Dean Smith's milestones.

Well, life as North Carolina knows it goes on after all.

The Tar Heels (24-6) have again finished the regular season in the ACC's top three, for the 33rd year in a row. They have won 20 games for a record 27th consecutive season. They have made their 23rd-straight NCAA tournament, another all-time standard.

And with Sunday's 64-54 victory over North Carolina State in the ACC tournament final, UNC claimed its 13th title under Smith, who is one game away from tying Adolph Rupp's career victory total of 876.

But more importantly for the immediate future, the victory was North Carolina's 12th straight since a loss at Duke on Jan. 29, a loss that made the Tar Heels 12-6 overall, 3-5 in the ACC and kept every one of their incredible streaks in peril.

``Usually I say I hope we make the NCAA tournament and they laugh,'' Smith said. ``This year, they didn't laugh.''

Look who's smiling now? Twelve wins in a row, and hope has been replaced by achievement, and expectation, once more. And in what beckons as an unusually wide-open postseason, which Kansas enters as the only dominant force, it has come to pass that UNC has as much chance to win five more games and a national title as anyone.

These Tar Heels are thin on depth - Smith used essentially six players during the ACC tournament - but they are long on fundamentals and skill, guard Shammond Williams, who went for 23 points Sunday, and forward Antawn Jamison (17 points and 11 rebounds) being prime examples.

And in a unique twist for a Smith team, one that can only help them over the next three weekends, the Tar Heels have already felt the cold sting of failure. It was a bracing slap that sparked plenty of midseason soul-searching and made the Heels confront their mortality, as it were.

``Yeah, we felt confused, especially because we had a good (nonconference) start,'' said senior center Serge Zwikker. ``We were 9-1, we were playing pretty well and then boom, 0-3. That's something that hurts a lot.''

``Most people were counting us out, they were talking about how Carolina didn't have a team anymore, they don't have players and things like that,'' Jamison said. ``But we turned things around. It's really sweet because everybody thought it wasn't going to happen. But we did it.''

Some point to the return of guard Vince Carter, who missed the 0-3 streak with a hip injury, as Carolina's impetus. Some say the development of slashing freshman point guard Ed Cota, the confidence and savvy ball-distribution he has shown, have been the really critical factors.

More likely, it is the mystery of Smith's influence, about which assistant coach Phil Ford, one of Smith's all-time great players, still speaks of in hushed tones.

``It's often said that he's blessed with great players, but you have to realize that not many young men coming out of high school really know how to play basketball,'' Ford said. ``There's a way the game should be played, and fortunately coach Smith teaches us how to play.''

Whatever it was then, whatever it is now, those who wish to dance on North Carolina's grave have been frustrated again. For them, 0-3 was lovely while it lasted. Beautiful, but all too brief.

``We just said, `Coach Smith's done it before, he can do it again,' '' Jamison said of the Tar Heels' faith when times were tough. ``Now, we've got one more, baby. One more tournament. One more goal.''

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