March Sadness Hits Chapel Hill

The games will be on at Michael Jordan’s 23 restaurant and the Top of the Hill brewery in Chapel Hill, N.C.

The patrons, however, will have to find a new rooting interest.

What was long obvious has finally come to pass: The NCAA tournament begins today without North Carolina for the first time since 1974, ending the longest streak in NCAA history at 27 years.

The state of North Carolina is doing fine with six teams in the field. That ties the record held by California--reached three times, including this season--and Indiana.

Call it the new Four Corners, even if the geography isn’t exact.

From North Carolina Wilmington on the coast--USC’s first-round opponent today--to the metropolis of Charlotte and nearby Davidson College to the Piedmont homes of Wake Forest, North Carolina State and Duke, the Tar Heel State is in the tournament, even if the Tar Heels aren’t.

Duke is more of a national phenomenon, sometimes considered to be in North Carolina but not of it. There are only two players from the state on Duke’s roster--both walk-ons, and more North Carolina alumni in Durham County than Duke alumni in the state.

North Carolina State won the 1974 championship with David Thompson and the 1983 title on the famous last-second dunk by Lorenzo Charles.

Wake Forest gave us/is responsible for Billy Packer, who played on the 1962 Final Four team.

But many people don’t realize all the history at Charlotte and Davidson.

Charlotte made the Final Four in 1977 with Cedric “Cornbread” Maxwell, losing to eventual champion Marquette on Jerome Whitehead’s game-winning shot in the semifinals.

Davidson twice reached the Elite Eight when Lefty Driesell was coach--only to lose each time to North Carolina, later his rival when he became Maryland’s coach.

Driesell was on a bus headed for a National Invitation Tournament game with his Georgia State team this week, but stopped to recall 1968 and ’69.

“The first time, they beat us but it was a close game, and we had some key players out.

“The next year, the game was at Cole Field House. We were up one, holding the ball, and they called a charge. Then they hit a shot to win it. Charlie Scott hit what would have been a three-pointer today.

“I’m not a North Carolina fan, but whether it’s North Carolina, Maryland, South Carolina, if you’re No. 1 in anything, people are shooting at you. They’ve been No. 1 so long with the program that Dean [Smith] built.”

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Selection Process Needs Reform

Butler and Bowling Green--those snubbed mid-majors--meet tonight in the NIT.

The nickname “Not In Tournament” was never more apt.

Gonzaga begins its NCAA road as a No. 6-seeded team--one that could meet Arizona in a second-round game between teams ranked in the top 10.

Terry Holland and Carroll Williams are two former NCAA selection committee members who have sat in that room.

They have stared at RPIs until their eyes drooped.

They agree on two things:

The NCAA selection committee has a hard job.

And there are serious shortcomings with the system.

“I can honestly say, you cannot walk out of that room and say you picked the best 64 teams,” said Holland, the former Virginia coach and athletic director who was on the committee for six years in the 1990s. “You can only say you did your best.”

When it comes to the so-called mid-majors, the NCAA is not doing well enough.

“They present a problem because it’s not a fair RPI,” Williams said, citing the drag a conference such as the West Coast puts on a team’s RPI, and the contrasting boost a team from a league such as the Big East gets.

“There’s one thing we’d say: You can’t do much about your family. You don’t like your family, you’re stuck with them. But your friends are who you choose. Gonzaga certainly did everything the committee asked.”

It’s no great surprise Williams feels that way. He coached at Santa Clara for 22 seasons, taking the Broncos to the tournament in 1987, and served on the committee for five years, ending last season after he retired as athletic director.

What might surprise you is that Holland’s and Williams’ convictions cross the lines of their presumed major/mid-major loyalties.

Williams wouldn’t have argued for a No. 3 for Gonzaga, as some have.

“I probably would have felt they might have been a fifth seed,” he said.

And Holland--brace yourself--is ready to consider limiting the number of teams from one conference.

He heard Dick Vitale suggest limiting leagues to five teams, and the more he thought about it, the less outrageous it sounded.

“We’re grasping at straws for some kind of line in the sand, but if the committee determines that, I can’t honestly say I believe the sixth-place team in a league has earned a shot at the national championship,” Holland said.

He says that even though some didn’t think his 1984 Virginia team should have made it, and the Cavaliers went all the way to the Final Four.

And as a committee member, he noticed something about the mid-majors.

“The teams we thought were really a stretch to give them a chance often seemed to do well, and certainly added a lot more flavor to things,” he said.

Another issue that has arisen is the role of conference tournaments.

Gonzaga Coach Mark Few might have sounded petulant when he said his team had nothing to gain by playing in the WCC tournament, but he was right.

And when the selection committee admitted it decided the No. 1 seedings without waiting to see if Oklahoma beat Kansas in the Big 12 title game, it sent another message about conference tournaments. (Why was a loss in the Big 12 title game just another game, and Butler’s quarterfinal loss in the Horizon League a knell?)

Holland tossed out an idea.

“I’d almost like to see something like saying you can’t have a No. 1 seed unless you won your conference tournament,” he said.

As it is, Holland sees too much potential for a team not to try its hardest to win, instead conserving energy for the next week.

Off the cuff, he said maybe the top four seedings in each region should go to tournament winners.

“If you knew the only way to get even a top 16 seed was to win your tournament, that would keep you pretty motivated,” he said.

“There’s too much motivation not to take them seriously.”

The biggest problem remains evaluating teams from conferences other than the big six football conferences.

Some people talk about a nonconference-only RPI.

“But the numbers are too small,” Holland said. “They tend to be skewered by one or two results.”

The answer seems to be for more committee members to see more games--especially in those difficult-to-evaluate leagues.

“How do you see Bowling Green play? They’re not on television,” Williams said. “And each committee member has another job.”

Some of the answers seem to be more mandatory tape-viewings, and more judgment calls.

“We’re trying to make a scientific process out of a very nonscientific competition,” Williams said.

By the way, one last thing about Williams and Holland.

Both of them figured Butler--a team that beat Wake Forest in the first round last year--was in.

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Wooden Award Intrigue

Jason Williams’ status as a runaway favorite for the Wooden Award as national player of the year slipped a little this week.

He wasn’t even player of the year in the Atlantic Coast Conference.

The award, selected by the media, went to Maryland’s Juan Dixon, who led the Terrapins to the regular-season championship.

Dixon, first on 41 of 84 ballots, averaged 19.3 points and led the ACC in steals at 2.7 a game and free-throw shooting at 90.8%.

Williams, first on 38 ballots, led the league in scoring at 21.7 points a game, was sixth in assists at 5.38, fourth in three-point percentage at 38.4%--and well down the list in free-throw shooting at 67.9%.

“I never expected to win it,” Dixon said. “There are so many guys out there, and everyone always said it was going to go to Jason Williams.

“Either one of us could have won it....If Duke would have won the league, maybe he would have won the award.”

The vote was taken before Maryland was upset by North Carolina State in the ACC tournament, won by Duke for the fourth consecutive year.

“I love Juan Dixon,” Duke Coach Mike Krzyzewski. “He’s just a terrific player. Competing against him for the last four years, I’ve found him to be as good and as competitive player as we’ve played against. It’s a well-earned honor, and I wish him the best.”

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The Times’ Rankings

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