Eight teams. Eight fan bases. Three days. Twelve games. One mega-resort. 3,300 seats. And don’t forget that kooky dancing basketball…

Just what was the Battle 4 Atlantis like, anyway?

All week long, through upsets and nailbiters, as ranked teams fell to confident challengers, people both here in Nassau and back home in America have been commenting about how strong a tournament this has been. But it took a trip to the Caribbean to actually get here, and the Imperial Arena (actually the Imperial Ballroom) isn’t very big. UNC folks were everywhere at the Atlantis – only Wisconsin’s fan base was bigger, and every other team was far behind – but still, this was a pretty tough ticket to get.

So here’s a look at part of what you might have missed – with photos taken (mostly) on Friday before and during UNC’s match with Florida.

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The lobby of the Atlantis Resort’s Royal Towers. Just like in the States, the Christmas decorations were out before Thanksgiving.

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Heather and Colin of Anthony Travel handled hospitality for UNC fans.

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Walking down the long hallway to the Imperial Ballroom Arena.

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Things start to get crowded in between games, as one group of fans leaves the arena and another group shuffles in. In this picture you can see a young Wisconsin fan bottom left and a Tar Heel fan there in the center. For those of you keeping score, there were three roughly equal groups of fans at Atlantis: UNC fans, Wisconsin fans, and every other fan base combined.

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Waiting just outside the hallway into the arena.

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Fans walked down a long hallway into a circular central area, made a right, walked down another long hallway into THIS circular central area, then made a left up there where it says “IMPERIAL ARENA” and entered from there. The arena itself is just on the other side of the wall with the UNC and UCLA banners.

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And here’s the entrance to the arena itself. Doors are on the left…

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…where the Tar Heels are warming up. Again, what you’re looking at is actually a 50,000-square foot ballroom, so the entire floor is carpeted; the court has been placed on top of the carpet and those bleachers are temporary. (It’s all extremely intimate – imagine Cameron Indoor Stadium with the upper deck removed. They had t-shirt guns for time-outs, but I saw one of the t-shirt gun guys casually underhand a shirt up into the stands – and it made it halfway back.)

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This photo’s dark, but this is your view entering the arena – you actually walk behind the back of the bleachers first.

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And then you round the corner and see this.

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If you happened to catch the games on TV, you probably noticed the unusual lighting. Here’s a shot of the blue lights, as the Heels and Gators continue warming up.

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They were handing these out to fans on Thursday. I’m not sure how many people used them; the games were exciting enough as it was.

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This guy is Bounce, the official mascot of the Battle 4 Atlantis. I liked him.

On Thanksgiving, Bounce was paired with a second mascot, a man-sized turkey dressed as a Pilgrim. (Not making that up.) It was the most Thanksgiving-y thing I saw all day: Paradise Island really does not feel like a foreign country in any manner – they even accept US currency – but Thanksgiving is not exactly a big holiday there. (Though to be fair, Paradise Island exists to be a tourist destination, so I’m not sure any holiday would feel all that big. Maybe Christmas, I guess, but otherwise it’s just one eternal Saturday.)

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Obviously I’m no professional photographer, but here are the pros, seated next to the basket in the middle of the game. See the guy with the dark hair and the mustache right in the middle, holding the big camera? That’s Nick Vitali; he took all the in-game shots for Chapelboro…

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…and that was his vantage point when he took this nice shot of Marcus Paige shooting over a Gator defender.

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The Tar Heels beat the Gators, 75-64. Afterwards, Coach Williams and the players got a loud ovation from the UNC fans in the hallway outside the arena as they waded their way into the press conference room. “We’re very appreciative,” said Williams after the UCLA game on Thursday, noting just how strong the UNC fan base was in Nassau this week.

I took this picture around 11:00, about an hour after the game was over; numerous Tar Heel players were still out there, signing autographs, shaking hands, and taking pictures with dozens of fans. The Battle 4 Atlantis in a nutshell: players, coaches, and fans all intermingling in the same resort. Total strangers shouting “Go Heels!” and “Go Badgers!” at each other as they passed. Very cool atmosphere.

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…and not a bad location either.