Art Chansky

The first CBS Sports Classic wasn’t exactly a classic, but there were strange juxtapositions through the two days in Chicago. Roy Williams said his players were kind of gaga during Friday’s practice in the United Center, where Michael Jordan won the last three of his six NBA Championships with the Bulls (the first three were in the old Chicago Stadium). “It’s almost like we were out in left field,” Williams said. “I said, ‘C’mon guys, we’ve got to have more enthusiasm.’ But they were sort of looking around.” The next day, they played about six minutes like Lady Gaga,...

I have never bought into the losing excuse that “we weren’t ready to play.” After a week of practices, team meetings and other various organized preparation, of course major college football teams are “ready to play.” If they are not, their coaches are stealing their six- and seven-figure incomes. What some teams don’t do as well as others is take the opponent’s first punch and respond in kind. That was obviously the case in UNC’s dismal 35-7 loss to N.C. State, which had a week off to prepare for the defining game of its season. The Wolfpack threw the...

If the paratroopers who dropped into Wallace Wade Stadium at halftime Thursday night had been returning from three years on Comet 67P, they would have looked at all the empty seats and the scoreboard that read UNC 28, Duke 7 and shrugged, “Same old, same old.” The Tar Heels edited the revisionist history of their last two games with Duke by pounding the ballyhooed and rebuilt Blue Devils into the stadium turf that will be lowered after the season to add more seats to the old horseshoe. Duke might want to wait another year or two to see if...

You have to hand it to Carolina’s defense. For the record-breaking unit in yards, first downs and points allowed, clearly the Tar Heels’ pièce de résistance is impeccable timing. On the second occasion this season, Carolina let the opponent score with enough time on the clock for the offense to go back down and win the dad-gum game. If I didn’t know any better, I would think they do it on purpose. Weren’t some savvy fans yelling, “Let ‘em score, let ‘em score” before the end of UNC’s 40-35 win over Pitt Saturday in Kenan Stadium? Just like against...

I never thought commissioning what turned out to be the Wainstein Report was a good idea because, while it was sure to provide some answers and details we did not have, it was also bound to rekindle more bad publicity for UNC and raise new questions. That is exactly what happened, from national magazines to major daily newspaper to the 48-hour news cycle that seems like it lasted for 48 days. And, of course, it pumped new life into the Raleigh News & Observer to try to connect more dots to what the Wainstein Report connected. Let’s start with...

Well, the debate over whether Carolina’s football team was both lucky and good or just lucky was answered Saturday in Miami. The Tar Heels seemed to be improving in a narrow loss at Notre Dame and comeback wins against Georgia Tech and Virginia.  They were the subject of some bad luck (code word for officiating), or they might have pulled off the upset in South Bend. But they clearly had some good fortune in rallying to defeat the Yellow Jackets (who scored too early at the end) and Cavaliers (who turned the ball over near the end). Against the unranked Hurricanes,...