Two humorous UNC notes.
First, Ol' Roy Williams has created the perfect opportunity for a drinking
game (we recommend taping it for later since the show airs at noon on Sunday):
every time Ol' Roy says "there's no doubt about it," which was about
10 times Sunday. Bottoms up!
And secondly, we understand UNC either has or will hang a banner for the
Helms Foundation title.
Al Featherston explained earlier why this is at best a dubious claim:
[Time out for a brief discussion about UNC's so-called 1924 'Helms
Foundation' national title. UNC fans would have you believe that's a pre-NCAA
poll that's similar to the championships awarded in college football today.
It's not.
The Helms Foundation titles were awarded starting in the early 1940s. A
committee of so-called experts went back and determined champions from the 1920s
and 1930s.
I have no idea who was on the committee, but I know their knowledge of
basketball history is not very good. While UNC did go 26-0 and win the Southern
Conference championship in Atlanta that season, the White Phantoms (as they were
known) were strictly a regional phenomenon. They played nobody outside the
South.
The problem is that Southern basketball just wasn't very good in that era.
UNC found that out a year later when they repeated as Southern Conference
champions, but ventured north and lost three straight -- two by lopsided margins
-- to Eastern teams.
The best basketball in 1924 was played in the East and Midwest. And what the
Helms researchers ignored is that there was a national tournament that season,
sponsored by the AAU. Butler, which beat the teams that were perceived as the
best in the country, won that event and also claims a 1924 national title.]
On the other hand, though, it's not every year when you can go from having
the same number of titles as your hated rival to having two more. A
masterpiece of collegiate propaganda!