•••
Fifteen years later, I walked into Allen Fieldhouse for the first time. I had, only a few weeks earlier, taken this job at The Kansas City Star. I had gone into the library and for days I read everything I could about Kansas and Missouri sports.
That did not prepare me. I was pretty sure I knew college basketball. I had grown up with North Carolina, of course, and I had written often about Kentucky and Indiana, and I had been yelled at by Bob Huggins, and I had been to Cameron Indoor Stadium and Freedom Hall and The Pit. I felt like I had seen pretty much everything.
Then I went to Allen Fieldhouse and it was … different. It was a Saturday afternoon; sunlight poured in through the windows over the retired jerseys — I’ve always loved afternoon games at Allen Fieldhouse best. The place smelled like buttered popcorn, at least to me, even though I’m not entirely certain they sell popcorn at Allen Fieldhouse.
It was loud that day; it’s hard to judge these things, but I don’t think it gets as loud at Cameron or Rupp Arena or Pauley Pavilion as it can get in the big moments of, say, a close Kansas-Missouri game. I’d heard the Rock Chalk Chant before, at an NCAA Tournament game, but it’s different when 16,000 are doing it at once, it’s kind of strange, a little bit haunted, unlike any other cheer.
Roy is right about one thing. People in North Carolina have no idea. Because of ESPN, everybody knows all about North Carolina. But Midwestern basketball is still a secret; they don’t know in North Carolina what an incredible place Gallagher-Iba is or what a terrific basketball tradition Kansas State has or how passionate fans are at Iowa State or what a unique and towering presence Norm Stewart was at Missouri for all those years.
They don’t know. They don’t realize that more Final Fours have been played at Municipal Auditorium in Kansas City than any other arena in the country.
After that first game at Allen Fieldhouse, I met Roy Williams for the first time. I told him I was from North Carolina. He semismiled and said: “Well, we play some pretty good basketball here, too.”
•••
OK, so let’s see if we can get all the connections straight. James Naismith invented basketball. We know that. He went to Kansas, where he coached Phog Allen, perhaps the most influential coach in college basketball history. OK.
Phog Allen coached Dean Smith at Kansas. Then Dean Smith won all those games and two national titles at North Carolina. Dean Smith coached Larry Brown at North Carolina. Then Larry Brown guided a team with Danny Manning and his backup singers to a national title for Kansas. Still with us?
Wilt Chamberlain played at Kansas, of course, and his most painful loss was in the 1957 championship game. To North Carolina. Dean Smith was ejected from one tournament game in his long career. That was against Kansas.
Bob Dole played at Kansas, and then he became a Kansas senator, and then he married Elizabeth Dole, and then she became a North Carolina senator.
And, of course, there’s the whole Roy Williams conundrum. Roy Williams was an assistant coach for Dean Smith at North Carolina, and then he went to replace Larry Brown at Kansas and then he reached four Final Fours, and then he went back to North Carolina (to replace his old Kansas assistant Matt Doherty) and then Williams won a national title, and now he’s coaching North Carolina (with his assistants, who all played at Kansas) against Kansas in the Final Four.
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