Art Chansky's Notebook

Chansky: The Fed-Up Factor

Posted by Art Chansky | Jan 13, 2014 | News | 0 |

Frankly, who could blame Roy Williams if he got so fed up that he quit after the season? Fans who are quick to criticize Ol’ Roy and those inside the university who have made his job harder and his life miserable ought to think about that. Where would UNC be if another casualty of the three-year scandal was losing its Hall of Fame coach who is as sensitive as he is hard-nosed? He has enough problems with a 10-6 basketball team whose talent level is lower than in any other of his previous 10 seasons at Carolina, with no...

Chansky: In Treatment

Posted by Art Chansky | Jan 6, 2014 | Sports Notebook | 0 |

Good afternoon, Coach Williams, would you prefer the leather chair or the couch?

Art’s Angle: A Sweet Song

Posted by Art Chansky | Dec 30, 2013 | Sports Notebook | 0 |

CHARLOTTE — Larry Fedora raised the Belk Bowl trophy and moments later grabbed the microphone to thank the Tar Heel fans for their support. “And next year will be even better!” Fedora promised. Indeed, unless someone steals Fedora with an offer he can’t refuse, the future of Carolina football burns bright. In posting the school’s sixth straight winning record, the Tar Heels completed their late season surge to reach a mid-level bowl and avoided the dreadful 6-7 finish of .500 teams that sneak into a bowl game and then lose it. The convincing 39-17 victory over a Cincinnati squad...

Chansky: A New Direction?

Posted by Art Chansky | Dec 20, 2013 | Sports Notebook | 0 |

Perhaps 2014 will mark a turning point for Carolina Athletics, which has been in almost constant turmoil since the summer of 2010 and caused immeasurable damage to the University’s reputation. Aside from the football program serving out the balance of a three-year NCAA probation, there appears to be no more reason for the governing body of college sports to be back on campus. Let it stay that way. It must be said, up front, that about 98 percent of the more than 750 scholarship athletes at Carolina have continued to embrace the oft-maligned label of student-athlete. Most varsity Tar...

Art’s Angle: A Day To Remember

Posted by Art Chansky | Dec 15, 2013 | News | 0 |

Kentucky was taller and more talented. Carolina was tougher. That about sums up how the Tar Heels outlasted the Wildcats in one of the greatest games (if not the prettiest) in Smith Center history. In its 29th season on campus, the old girl was never louder, never better looking and never happier when the horn sounded on UNC’s 82-77 victory over the 10th-ranked ‘Cats, as Carolina became the first basketball team this season to take down three top-ten opponents. First off, most every seat was filled long before tip-off, a tribute to the marquee match-up, the convenient 5:15 starting time and all the hype about the 36th renewal of the early December rivalry that took a year off in 2012. And when patrons arrived, they found white Carolina t-shirts draped over the back of every chair, a planned “white-out” compliments of UNC supplier Nike. A few people refused to put them over whatever they were wearing, and video cameras catching those culprits shamed them into joining the crowd. It was one of many cool and colorful promotions in a building whose atmosphere has been completely made over the last two years – from the booming voice of PA announcer Tony Gillam, to an electronic ribbon board all around the fascia of the upper deck to enhanced graphics and features by Ken Cleary and his UNC New Media staff. Between...

Chansky: What Were They Thinking?

Posted by Art Chansky | Dec 13, 2013 | Sports Notebook | 0 |

Surely, the terms of paying off fired football coach Butch Davis include that he cannot disparage his former employer. If so, Davis may have just flushed the two remaining payments of nearly $600,000 each (due in January of 2014 and 2015) down the toilet with comments he made in the recent cbssports.com article. Reading that will cause local jaws to drop. Davis, who can’t seem to find another coaching job, tells the story of his firing from UNC in exhaustive detail, basically claiming he had no prior knowledge of the impermissible benefits and that the seeds of the academic scandal preceded him by more than 10 years. He also trashes Holden Thorp, saying the former chancellor fired him to save his own job. We’ve heard it all before, perhaps in not such gory detail. The most damaging parts of the article are comments from former Chancellor James Moeser and ex-athletic director Dick Baddour, who attempt to legitimize Davis’ claims. They are retired and should retire from interfering in a controversy that their school wants to let die; Moeser and Baddour also throw Thorp under the bus, which does not serve the university they both claim to love. Moeser says in the article that, if he were still chancellor at the time, he would not have fired Davis. And Baddour reveals that it was not his recommendation to release the...

Chansky: Go Figure (It Out)

Posted by Art Chansky | Dec 5, 2013 | Basketball | 1 |

Congratulations, Wes Miller, and watch out, Kentucky! If the Tar Heels’ wacky season stays true to form, they will either lose to or be taken to the wire Saturday night by UNC-Greensboro, which is coached by Miller, another former member of the UNC program. Then they’ll come back a week later and run (soon to be) second-ranked Kentucky out of the Smith Center (probably with another Roy Williams hissy fit in between). And if that happens, the Heels will have struggled with four mid-majors (including Holy Cross) while defeating the No. 1, No. 2 and No. 3 teams in...

Art’s Angle: Duke Sharper, Smarter

Posted by Art Chansky | Dec 1, 2013 | News | 0 |

After carrying confidence and momentum into the regular season finale, Carolina found itself outplayed, out-coached and, yes, outsmarted by a Duke team that now calls itself ACC Coastal Division champion. How could that happen when almost everything (including a 5.5 point spread) seemed to favor the Tar Heels at home on Senior Day before a capacity crowd that mostly arrived on time after causing a massive traffic jam surrounding Kenan Stadium? Well, the 10-2 Blue Devils made one mistake all of the sunny, brisk day under clear Carolina Blue skies, a muffed punt by their star Jamison Crowder that...

Chansky: Don’t Worry About Duke

Posted by Art Chansky | Nov 27, 2013 | News | 0 |

As the Duke-Carolina football game with the most at stake in the last 50 years approaches, many Tar Heels fans are fretting more over the Blue Devils than usual this time of the year. After all, who would imagine that Duke might reach the ACC football championship game before Carolina? That’s what a Duke victory (9-2 and 5-2 in the ACC) produces Saturday in Kenan Stadium. And what about all these basketball superstars Mike Krzyzewski continues to sign when his own Hall of Fame career is supposed to be winding down, not revving up? Well, nothing is ever as...

Art’s Angle: 80 In Switzerland

Posted by Art Chansky | Nov 24, 2013 | News | 0 |

What would have happened if Larry Fedora hadn’t told his team to literally lay down with an 80-20 lead over Old Dominion in a mercy-shortened massacre Saturday at Kenan Stadium? Well, one more touchdown or even a field goal would have allowed the Tar Heels to surpass the ACC record for points in a game (82). Either/or would have also outscored the UNC basketball team, which posted a hard-fought 82-72 win over Richmond at the Hall of Fame Tip-off Classic up in Connecticut. And, since the 80 came in the first three quarters, they might well have scored 100...