Catching Up

The celebration continues and just think. We have 48 more weeks to revel in the fact that we are national champions before someone else can claim the prize. Non Carolina people I come in contact with seem to want to talk about nothing else but the fact that we will be depleted next year, but they are not getting through to me. Mrs. Ramfanatic was asked the other day by a non admiring fan what we were going to do next year since we had lost all of our players. She has become pretty adept at the repartee and responded by saying that we would probably do what other teams including hers did this year, lose. It was a perfect response because her questioner wanted to detract from the national championship by addressing our situation next year. It gives them comfort but I refuse to help them.

One of my close friends has a place of business where he deals extensively with the public. His son gave him several National Championship items that he plans to hang on his walls for the world to see. One of the items he received is a blanket like rendition of "National Championship-2005. He and I are in the process of having a sign made which reads, " I don't know about next year, but I sure do know about this one." That should hold the detractors for a while and alert them to the fact that we plan to stay focused on the positive and not the negative aspects of this past season.

Coach Williams is hot on the recruiting trail and has a top prospect in Chapel Hill this weekend. I hope we will have some good news in the near future. His name is Echefu and I'm told it is pronounced like the sound one makes when they sneeze. I sincerely hope we have to learn how to pronounce it correctly in the near future because that will mean he decided to become a Tar Heel.

I attended the Rams Club meeting here in Richmond last Monday and thoroughly enjoyed spending some one on one time with Woody Durham, Coach Bunting, and Coach Robinson. All three are terrific representatives of UNC and I sincerely hope that Coach Robinson decides to stay with us. His name is being mentioned as a possible replacement for the coach (Wainwright) at the University of Richmond who has moved on to DePaul. Saw a couple of good movies on UNC that makes one feel really good about being a Tar Heel as if we needed an more reasons. I hate to say it, but that's the last Rams Club meeting I plan to attend in Richmond if the meeting is held downtown. I won't go into details, but I would rather drive to Norfolk or Raleigh than to go through what I did last Monday. I talked with Ken Mack, V.P. of the Rams Club about my concern over the location of the meeting and I feel like he understands why I am displeased with the selection of the meeting site. He was not responsible for the site being selected.

I saw something interesting concerning ACC area baseball the other day that I would like to share. Without getting into the mechanics of recruiting junior college players, here are the the number of jucos on some selected teams in the area. I haven't verified the numbers but the poster on a message board seemed credible so here goes:

1.N.C. State............. 13
2.South Carolina....11
3.ECU............................10
4.Clemson................... 7
5.FSU..............................6
6.UNC.............................1

I didn't have access to the total list for the area, but I would like to know how many Ga. Tech, Miami, and Virginia Tech have. I, for one am pleased with the approach to recruiting that our baseball program is taking even though I was thoroughly disappointed with our performance against Miami a couple of weeks ago and on national tv, no less.

Did you hear about the Wonderlic scores achieved by some ACC players in preparation for entry into the NFL? Three UNC players were tested and two fell into the normal or average range and one scored well above average. The three players were Jason Brown, Madison Hedgecock, and Gerald Sensabaugh. The Wonderlic is a brief test designed to measure intelligence and I had several years of experience administering the test when I was employed at the University of Virginia. One player from the University of Virginia scored a 6 which is the lowest score I have ever seen. There must have been something outside the test that caused a score this low. If he didn't give the test his best effort, he must not understand that the NFL pays attention to these scores and a performance this low could cost him dollars in the future. A bad reputation is hard to shake.I'm glad the player was from UVA and not UNC to say the least. I'm not going to give his name but he was a standout player.

Check the Guest Book for the comment received from someone who identified herself as the daughter of Clyde Austin. She sounds legit and she pointed out what she says are several errors in my article on Clyde Austin, her father. I responded on the Guest Book and revealed my sources for the information I included in the article. I apologized to her if some of the information was in error but much of it came from the Richmond Times Dispatch. I had no reason to doubt the information provided me by my former assistant.

Enjoy being the National Champions in basketball.