Art Chansky’s Sports Notebook is presented by The Casual Pint. YOUR place for delicious pub food paired with local beer. Choose among 35 rotating taps and 200+ beers in the cooler.
The Atlantic Coast Conference has reached septuagenarian status.
Let’s look at its five-year birthdays since it was founded for the 1953-54 college season.
Before the ACC’s fifth season, 1958-59, Frank McGuire hired little-known assistant Dean Smith, who would succeed him three years later. In 1964, Smith had his last non-winning record (12-12) of his famed 36-year tenure.
In 1969, 15 years in, Smith’s program won its third straight ACC Championship behind UNC’s first Black scholarship athlete Charlie Scott. In 1974, State won its first NCAA title with Black superstar David Thompson and white giant Tom Burleson.
In 1978-79, Carolina and Duke met four times with each winning twice. They could have played a fifth time in the NCAA East Regional before both lost second-round games at State’s Reynolds Coliseum, Penn upsetting UNC and St. John’s ousting Duke in what was dubbed Black Sunday.
In 1984, two years after Smith won his first NCAA crown, the Tar Heels again had the best team in the country with Michael Jordan, Sam Perkins and freshman Kenny Smith, but lost in the Sweet Sixteen to unranked Indiana.
In 1989, Duke and UNC met in the long-considered most intense game in ACC history, the tourney championship in Atlanta where Smith and Duke’s upstart coach Mike Krzyzewski screamed at each other on the sideline.
In 1994, Carolina was favored to win its second straight NCAA title just as Duke had gone back-to-back in 1991 and ’92, but the Heels were upset by Boston College in the second round. The Devils advanced to the national championship game in Charlotte, losing to Arkansas.
The 1999 NCAA tournament ended badly for both schools, Carolina losing to Weber State in the first round and Duke to UConn in the last minutes of the national championship.
By 2004, Roy Williams had succeeded the Smith era by returning to Chapel Hill, where he had been an assistant for 10 years and then emerged as a star coach at Kansas.
In 2009, Williams won the second of three NCAA championships with a dominating team behind National and ACC Player of the Year Tyler Hansbrough.
UNC’s 2014 season ended with a controversial 2nd-round loss to Iowa State on a timing issue that led to a new device where an official’s whistle would stop the clock.
And 2019 was Williams’ last great team, sharing the ACC regular season title with Virginia before losing to Duke in the tourney final and to Auburn in the Sweet 16.
And here we are, another five years later, and another NCAA tournament with the Tar Heels who are back in a familiar position as No.1 seed in Charlotte, which they earned by winning the ACC regular season for the 33rd time. They are 12-1 in NCAA games played in the Queen City from where they have advanced to the Final Four three times in the 70-year history of the conference.
Featured image via Associated Press/Alex Brandon
Art Chansky is a veteran journalist who has written ten books, including best-sellers “Game Changers,” “Blue Bloods,” and “The Dean’s List.” He has contributed to WCHL for decades, having made his first appearance as a student in 1971. His “Sports Notebook” commentary airs daily on the 97.9 The Hill WCHL and his “Art’s Angle” opinion column runs weekly on Chapelboro.Chapelboro.com does not charge subscription fees, and you can directly support our efforts in local journalism here. Want more of what you see on Chapelboro? Let us bring free local news and community information to you by signing up for our newsletter.
Comments on Chapelboro are moderated according to our Community Guidelines