North Carolina Tar Heels: Nominated to the FanSided Fandom 250
The North Carolina Tar Heels fan base has been nominated to the FanSided Fandom 250.
The North Carolina Tar Heels have an interesting distinction amongst the teams of the ACC. They are the one that everyone else seems to dislike. This was more true in a smaller ACC when rivalries were more intimate. The oldest rivalry in the South is between the Heels and Virginia. The area rivalries with Duke, Wake Forest, and NC State are pretty important. There is the true Carolina dispute with South Carolina. There is the first university dispute with Georgia. Then there is East Carolina popping up every now and then.
To give you an idea, I was in middle school and wore an old Tar Heels sweatshirt a lot. It was my father’s and frankly it was a little ratty in the right shoulder. My middle school principal decided to give me a present. It was a bumper sticker. It proclaimed ‘My two favorite teams are Virginia’ and the lower sub message read ‘And whoever is playing Carolina.’ I wasn’t sure how to react at thirteen to this and the joke was lost on me.
Part of this distinction seems to make the Tar Heels fans more clannish than some others since there are so many contenders. It also gets the Tar Heels fan base criticized. They are too wine and cheese for their opponents. This characterization has grabbed hold particularly in the modern era where Kenan Stadium and the Smith Center have perhaps grown too big to adequately show the passion of the fanbase.
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Carolina fans are best defined by their basketball loyalty. They can fill up the 20,000+ seat Smith Center for most foes. If it seems less raucous than other places it is because the acoustics and perhaps because of the older fans that own season tickets in the closer seats. There was an effort to move the students down from the rafters around ten years ago and it has added some atmosphere. In the moments that the Smith Center is fully aroused it can be an experience like no other.
It was not always about the Smith Center. If Cameron is the standard now for fan engagement, then Tar Heels fans can point to the times when the Heels played in Carmichael Auditorium. Connected to Carmichael Dorm the much smaller arena brought a noisy and more intimate setting right in the middle of campus. This is where Michael Jordan and James Worthy played, not the bigger more detached Smith Center.
Then there is football. Once that was the big show on campus in the 40s. The problem probably lies with a lack of big time success despite spurts of potential greatness. Football does not have the following that basketball enjoys, but recent years have changed the dynamic of Kenan a bit. As recently as ten years ago State fans might have filled up half the bowl or at least appeared to. Now that and a more active student section yield a better atmosphere.
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Perhaps the greatest asset of the Tar Heel fanbase is its size. Thanks to Smith, Jordan, Lawrence Taylor, and national championships in multiple sports, the Tar Heels are always amongst the highest selling college related apparel every year. That reflects a nationwide appeal to match the numbers of in-state loyalists.
So if you want the Tar Heels to be correctly ranked by the FanSided Fandom 250, be sure to support the Heels.