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Letter From the Editor: A few thoughts about basketball

Posted on April 3, 2008 by Staff

Whenever the team is encountering difficulties or perhaps in a close contest, Woody Durham, the enthusiastic voice of the Tar Heels, can often be heard telling people to “go where you go and do what you do.”

Usually this happens during a timeout or other breaks in the action, so one could assume that he means something along the line of “now would be a good time to get a beverage or take care of any business.” It does not. He is suggesting that those of you who are fans who have any sort of good-luck ritual might consider performing said ritual to assist the team in the pursuit of victory.

As the Heels march closer to the ultimate goal, many people take this advice to heart and carry it to a rather, well, absurd extent.

After the last win, that was apparent, for the talk among many fans was as much about the rituals of luck as it was the game itself. A stranger – who might assume that the key to the game was the effectiveness of putting the ball through the metal cylinder and preventing the other team from doing the same – might be surprised to find out that it was really a matter of an individual a few hundred miles away wearing a threadbare pair of lucky blue socks or the fact that Cousin Ed watched the game in the parlor in the second half rather than the kitchen.

This is not to say that there is nothing to this. Belief and confidence in one’s abilities is important in sports, and the fans are a part of that. Fan support, especially here in the team’s home community, is certainly a confidence builder. But once the game has started, unless you’re courtside or within shouting distance of it, there is not a thing you can do to alter the outcome, no matter where you go or what you do.

To take the obsession with one’s own impact to the heights we’ve seen of late is common this time of year, but try not to get too caught up in it. Through hard work, determination and good coaching, the team won the game. Though she looked quite fetching in her blue sweater and was hoarse for days afterward, Aunt May had very little to do with it.

Which brings us to the latest trend of basketball hipsters — the eschewing of brackets. Here again, the theme is the personalization of wins and loses on the court of play. But in this case, it is not a belief in a higher power, but the desire to be right — often in reference to contests between teams one has no idea about. The result is that instead of watching a game and enjoying the fact that Podunk State pulled it out in the last minute over Giant U, the impact on your bracket and the lust for that office-pool cash determines your mood.
Basketball is a game, a really great game. Over the years, we’ve attached rituals and other games to it. Pardon our aestheticism, but when the rituals of fandom and gambling start to overshadow the efforts of the young people playing and their coaches, it’s time to get back to the basics.

All that said: Go Heels. We mean that most sincerely.

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