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Maybe Maui will be recovering for UNC’s visit in 2024.
Of all the places around the world that basketball took him, Roy Williams liked Maui the best. Not liked, loved.
Perhaps because he grew up in a poor family where there weren’t as many sunny days, Ol’ Roy couldn’t believe all he saw from the job Dean Smith gave him as a $2,700 part-time assistant coach.
Maui showed him beautiful beaches with bright, blue water; scenic sunrises and sunsets; majestic mountains and luscious inland.
And, of course, the big-time basketball in a small gym but with ESPN televising all the games back home from as brilliant of a background viewers will ever see.
With hundreds of people dead and many more expected from the horrific fires that spread so quickly, Williams must be devastated about what happened in his paradise.
It is hard to believe Maui and the town of Lahaina will be rebuilt enough to hold the annual invitational on Thanksgiving week. Look for the 2023 event to be moved to Honolulu or Las Vegas, where it went during COVID in 2021 and would draw bigger crowds and maybe get more TV money from ESPN.
For the teams it is still a business trip, and this year’s entries Gonzaga, Kansas, Marquette, Purdue, Syracuse, Tennessee, UCLA and host school Chaminade will not be able to experience it in the right context or lend a helping hand while over there.
Next year will be the Tar Heels’ first time back since Roy retired, and you bet he and Wanda will be on the trip. Perhaps they are already giving to the recovery effort.
Carolina usually goes every four years and has brought home four Maui championship surfboards, three before winning NCAA titles at the end of those seasons – 2004, 2008 and 2016, when point guards Raymond Felton, Ty Lawson and Joel Berry II were the respective tourney MVPs.
The Tar Heels have been in the event eight times (tied with Arizona for the most) and have an overall record of 22-4, second only to Duke’s 19-1 in six trips. Next year’s field will also include Auburn, Colorado, Dayton, Iowa State, Memphis, Michigan State and UConn — UNC’s opponent on opening day — November 25.
Hopefully, it will have given the “Valley Isle” enough time to be rebuilding from this heartbreaking tragedy.
Featured image via Associated Press/Rick Bowmer
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