In 1966, Charles “Charlie” Scott (b. 1948 in NYC) became the first African American student to attend the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill on an athletic scholarship. He decided to attend UNC rather than basketball powerhouse Davidson College after a wrenching moment at a small café in Davidson, North Carolina. Former Davidson College basketball star Terry Holland, who both played and later served as assistant coach under the college’s legendary coach Lefty Driesell, and UNC law professor and civil rights attorney Daniel H. Pollitt, who was a passionate advocate for social justice in Chapel Hill during the 1950s and 1960s, vividly recall Scott’s historic decision. Pollitt worked with Dean Smith, UNC’s beloved basketball coach (1961-1997) and Robert Seymour, progressive minister at the Olin T. Binkley Baptist Church in Chapel Hill, to recruit Charlie Scott and to help integrate the university community. Continue Reading Marcie Cohen Ferris: Civil Rights, Lunch Counters, and North Carolina Basketball
I’m targeting the person who has dreamed of diving a sunken U-boat, or mountain biking a twisty trail in the Pisgah National Forest, or paddling his or her way down a mountain creek, but thought, “Nah. I could never do that.” My goal is to tell you that you can. All the reader needs is a spark of adventurous spirit. The book will, hopefully, ignite that spirit and push the reader into action. Continue Reading Interview: Joe Miller on Adventure Sports in the Carolinas
Forty years ago in the ACC tournament finals, the North Carolina State Wolfpack and the University of Maryland Terrapins played a game that experts generally consider the best ever played in conference history. NC State was ranked number one in the country and Maryland was close behind at number four. The game was so memorable not only for the exceptional quality of play but also for the magnitude of the stakes. At that time, only one team per conference qualified for the NCAA tournament, and winning the ACC tournament was essential to compete for the national championship. Continue Reading J. Samuel Walker: The ACC’s Greatest Game
The footage shows not a player who was intentionally tanking a match, but one who was consistently and masterfully outplayed by a superior opponent, which Riggs admitted at the time and maintained right up until his death in 1995. The unsupported ESPN allegations have no place in sporting history. Continue Reading Susan Ware: The Ongoing Battle of the Sexes
The Vegetarian Magazine, the monthly publication of the Vegetarian Society of America, welcomed the development, explaining that a halfback was made “strong and elastic” from “oatmeal porridge and cranberry sauce.” In contrast, meat-eating opponents were characterized as “rude and coarse.” Continue Reading Adam D. Shprintzen: Are You Ready for Some Vegetarian Football?
Our Holiday Sale is now underway! If you need some gift ideas for the folks on your list, our Southern Gateways catalog is a great place to start. Southern Gateways is where we collect of all our general interest books about this region we call home. Continue Reading Southern Gateways: essential southern reading that makes a great gift
The current scholarly consensus holds that no single individual created baseball; rather, it evolved incrementally from various forms of bat-and-ball folk games, including British rounders. This cultural form of transatlantic hybrid pedigree grew into a modern team sport in Philadelphia, Boston, and New York in the early nineteenth century, with each of these burgeoning northeastern American cities developing its distinctive formats of the game. Continue Reading Excerpt: Transpacific Field of Dreams, by Sayuri Guthrie-Shimizu
It’s important for Heels fans to remember what Lucas tells us in ‘Carolina Basketball’: while the ACC tournament is important to fans and programs for many reasons, winning on Sunday doesn’t necessarily lead to ultimate success at end of season. Of the last three Tar Heels’ NCAA championship runs, none started by winning the ACC tournament. Continue Reading ACC Tourney Time: Have Patience, Tar Heel Fans
The ACC benefited from the economic growth and unprecedented prosperity in the South after World War II. Southerners generally had more disposable income than ever and many used it to attend basketball games at ACC schools, or at least to buy television sets that broadcast ACC games. Further, the stronger economic status of Southern states encouraged much-needed improvements in education, including the allocation of greater resources to public universities. One result was that members of the ACC took steps to upgrade their academic programs and prestige. Another result was the ability of several ACC schools to build modern basketball arenas. Continue Reading Interview: J. Samuel Walker on the History of ACC Basketball
The first two decades of ACC basketball laid the foundations for the success on a national stage that the league has enjoyed ever since. Continue Reading J. Samuel Walker: Why ACC Basketball Fans Should Care about the Early History of the Conference
Get your copy of Carolina Basketball: A Century of Excellence at Bull’s Head Bookshop on the UNC campus and enter to win a Carolina basketball prize package. Continue Reading Tar Heel basketball season kicks off with book sale and giveaway
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