If you think COVID football is weird, you should witness basketball under these conditions.

How much of this could you see on TV? From the isolated press seats in the upper deck, I couldn’t decide if I was watching a uniformed scrimmage of antmen or visiting some gigantic gymnasium at a deserted Disneyland.

Eight minutes before tip off against College of Charleston, I literally counted 82 fans in the stands, most of them related to players. When the teams took the court, maybe it was up to 100 fans, way below the allowed 7 percent of capacity (@about 1600).

Nothing Wednesday night seemed normal, except for what was happening between the white lines. Carolina’s bench, usually a lateral row of chairs on the sideline, was reconfigured into four rows of five chairs each. Every player who sat in those chairs wore a mask, before they went into the game or after they came out.  The ten Tar Heel masked student managers had their own socially distanced chairs on the baseline, where fats cats usually sit.

During timeouts they quickly set up semi-circle at the corner of the court, every person surrounding Roy Williams wearing masks except for those who were playing when the timeout ended. When the huddle broke, Ol’ Roy and the players exchanged “air first bumps.” All five coaches coached in masks all the time.

Sounds blasted from the speakers above, from the Here Comes Carolina! song when the Tar Heels came out to play, through the national anthem and into the drum line that accompanies the UNC lineup being introduced. No different from a regular game, but annoyingly loud without the buzz of the fan base beneath.

And the Tar Heels looked different, mostly thank the Lord. The court’s namesake started freshman guards – a point who is 6-foot-4 and a shooter who is 6 feet. This is a talented two-guard front if Carolina has ever had one (and I don’t think it has).

The guys on the second row of the bench waited patiently to be called and pull off their masks. The guys in the third row were rooting for a blow out and anyone sitting behind them wasn’t getting in.

Oh, yes, the game. Carolina broke it open with a 17-0 run in the second half, when bad defense suddenly turned to good. Garrison Brooks played the most minutes and was his old self. But the new guards, Caleb Love and R.J. Davis, combined for 28 points and both can score. And rotating bigs freshman Day’Ron Sharpe and sophomore Armando Bacot, who each played exactly 22 minutes, combined for 25 points and 18 rebounds.

If this is the new normal, it looks like a normal Tar Heel team will part of it.

 

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