We’ve all become friends over the past month or so, primarily because of Carolina. We watched together as UNC blew a 10-point lead the first time it met Duke this season, then we watched together as the Heels advanced in the NCAA tournament.
Last night, at about 1 a.m. Madrid time, we watched a shoulda-woulda-coulda-been season come to a close. We were a long way from home, a long way from Chapel Hill, sitting around tables in an Irish pub called Dubliners, where the games air on a projector screen. They serve beer in buckets and chicken wings that pass for decent, but it’s never quite right.
For me, watching big games at Dubliners has become a bit routine. I saw every pitch of Roy Halladay’s postseason no-hitter against the Reds there, as well as a number of important NFL and Carolina games.
But last night was different. Last night, we had an entire cheering section, a group of current students and alumni to shout “TAR … HEELS!” “TAR … HEELS!” and share the experience of pulling for a team that everyone knew had the odds stacked against it. We all thought about Kendall Marshall’s wrist, John Henson’s wrist (and later his ankle), and all the other UNC body parts that had been amputated from the roster earlier in the season. Yet we showed up in Carolina T-shirts, polos, and white Jordan jerseys, an awesome Rameses hat, and long-since-broken blue sunglasses that no longer have lenses but still show their colors.
At different points in the night, we all longed for Chapel Hill. “We have so much school pride,” Chetan said to me. “I don’t know of other schools where it works the same way. I mean, look at this.”
He was right. There’s something about Tar Heel pride that extends beyond the school’s sports. “It’s because we get a great education,” I said.
“And because it’s a great place,” Chetan added.
“And because it’s a great place.”
We missed The Thrill last night before we lost. And even more so, it seemed, afterward.
As time wound down, our spirits followed suit, and when it was all over we all stood up with an air of, “Well, that was fun. Not.”
I tried to remind them of the good of the night — that we were all together — by throwing my arms around them and, with Chetan’s help, leading them in our alma mater, “Hark the Sound.” It was a painful rendition, fed mostly by two former students who didn’t care if it came after a losing effort; it felt cathartic to merely be able to sing it with other Tar Heels. Having not personally set foot in Chapel Hill in two years (that feel like five), it helped me ease the pain of watching some terrific players who may not don Carolina blue again bow out because of breaks, sprains and tears.
For the current students, the singing of “Hark the Sound” seemed inappropriate. For them, this one hurt more. This was their chance at a national championship. Chetan and I got one in 2009, and he had the 2005 one to boot.
Looking through The Daily Tar Heel‘s photo gallery today, I came across a photo (number 67 of 72) that will for me encapsulate the Tar Heels’ season: Kendall Marshall sits in the UNC locker room after the game, wearing a white dress shirt, a Carolina blue tie and a stunned expression of loss. In the background, walking to the team showers, is freshman fill-in, last-man-standing point guard Stillman White. A number 11 jersey, the same color as his last name, is still on his back. He has a sweat towel slung around his neck and another one balled up in his right hand. His head is bowed toward the floor. Marshall’s looks off into the distance. Both are searching for what coulda, shoulda, woulda been.
At Dubliners’ Irish Pub on Calle de Espoz y Mina in Madrid, Spain, a group of Tar Heel juniors gathered to catch the 1:30 a.m. metro home, sporting the same looks of dejection as their basketball-playing counterparts. It was too soon for them to sing “Hark the Sound,” just as it was too soon for Kendall Marshall to move and for Stillman White to lift his head.
There will be other Carolina games, and other chances to sing, and the Carolina fans’ wounds will heal along with Marshall’s wrist. But the memory of this night will linger — for some, it will linger on the court of the Edward Jones Dome, for many others, it will do so in Chapel Hill, and for a group of seven people united by school pride, this one will continue to sting in a dimly-lit, Spanish Irish pub.
Had the Tar Heels won the national championship, that’s where we woulda watched it.
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