North Carolina still waiting for its real redemption

Hawaii got a close-up look at this year’s NCAA basketball champions, as North Carolina played the host Rainbow Warriors last Nov. 18. The Rainbow Warriors fell 83-68 to the Tar Heels, but the game was closer than the score. UH trailed by as few as three points in the second half.

The Tar Heels were ranked No. 5 at the time. The ‘Bows — with just one rotation player from the previous year’s team — were still trying to figure out who they were. They’d lost their opener against SIU-Edwardsville (which ended up going 6-24) and won against those basketball behemoths Texas State and Florida Atlantic.

But it’s not like the Rainbows found a groove through gained confidence in going up-and-up with North Carolina for much of their game — at least not right away: the loss to the Tar Heels started a 2-8 skid for UH.

It was later when Hawaii jelled, winning eight of 12 during a stretch of the Big West season.

The one thing these programs had in common last November was the NCAA hanging over their heads. The difference was while Hawaii was suffering from sanctions it was still pretty much business as usual for North Carolina.

Because the Rainbows, at the time, were saddled by a postseason ban, three players who started or were in the playing rotation on the team that won the Big West and took down Cal in the first round of the NCAA Tournament the previous season had left the program early.

Would 2015-16 Big West player of the year Stefan Jankovic, starting wing Aaron Valdes and sturdy backup big man Stefan Jovanovic have made enough of a difference to beat North Carolina on that Friday evening at the Stan Sheriff Center last fall?

We’ll never know, but it’s conceivable.

When the NCAA appeals committee finally lifted the postseason ban on UH days before the Big West tournament last month, the damage was already done — a year earlier.

Meanwhile, North Carolina hums along, regardless of the sad song of coach Roy Williams.

Since the Tar Heels played in the 2016 championship game but lost to Villanova only because of a last-second shot, there was plenty of talk of this year’s final being a “redemption” game.

That word, redemption, is one of those that can mean a few different things.

In sports, it’s usually shorthand for a player making up for a mistake, or a team coming back after a big loss to win, like in this case.

We often hear it in religious circles, where it refers to “the act of saving people from sin and evil.”

By that definition of the word, North Carolina’s redemption — or punishment — is on hold.

If we here in Hawaii thought the NCAA moved slowly, look at how long it’s taking to deal with the decades-long academic scandal at Chapel Hill. That’s probably because hundreds of student-athletes — including men’s basketball players — were steered toward fake classes for 18 years.

Recently, North Carolina received a third, revised, “Notice of Allegations” from the NCAA. The university has claimed that it took care of its problems enough internally, but the allegations include the dreaded “lack of institutional control.” That terminology means North Carolina could be in a lot of trouble, no matter how hard it slapped its own wrist.

North Carolina isn’t the first school and it won’t be the last to offer Mickey Mouse classes that help athletes (and other “students”) maintain minimum standards to remain enrolled. But this was serial killing of the concept of higher education, over nearly two decades.

And while it’s true the current players on the national championship team weren’t the beneficiaries of these fake classes, it’s hard to feel sorry for Williams when he whines about how the ongoing investigation makes recruiting so hard, resulting in fewer McDonald’s All-Americans finding their way to Chapel Hill.

North Carolina made good on its second chance in this year’s championship game Monday. It’s not going to be that easy with the NCAA. Although we have good reason to think of college sports’ governing body as a joke, it does take academic fraud seriously.

UH, its sins venial by comparison with those of North Carolina, finally did get its redemption. Too bad it was a year late.

Reach Dave Reardon at dreardon@staradvertiser.com or 529-4783. His blog is at Hawaiiwarriorworld.com/quick-reads.