North Carolina Office of Archives and History

ACC Basketball: An Illustrated History by Ron MorrisReview by: William H. BeezleyThe North Carolina Historical Review, Vol. 66, No. 1 (JANUARY 1989), p. 120Published by: North Carolina Office of Archives and HistoryStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/23520774 .

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120 Book Reviews

the largest buy-out ever. In any case, sports is perhaps an area where history does repeat itself.

Don Higginbotham

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

ACC Basketball: An Illustrated History. By Ron Morris. (Chapel Hill: Four Corners Press, 1988. Endpapers, references, index, acknowledgments. Pp. 320. $39.95.)

University of North Carolina basketball fans clear off your coffee tables.

Here's a book for you. Author Ron Morris, publisher Art Chansky, and

free-lancers John Feinstein, Barry Jacobs, and Dick Herbert celebrate the

thirty-fifth anniversary of the Atlantic Coast Conference with 320 pages of

conference basketball, featuring 350 photographs, year-by-year analysis of

each season, and 36 individual profiles (11 coaches and 25 players). ACC basketball fans, including South Carolina rooters, will enjoy the book; Tar

Heel fans will love it. Each of the four decades in which the conference has existed receives

consideration. There are special profiles of coaches: Everett Case in the

1950s, Vic Bubas in the 1960s, and Dean Smith in the 1980s. The profile for the 1970s goes to David Thompson.

North Carolina State University claims three of the four major vignettes: Case—coach of the Wolfpack; Bubas—a player and graduate of NCSU before coaching Duke; and, of course, Thompson—a player and graduate of NCSU. And the Wolfpack's Tom Burleson is on the Duke bftie cover.

Nevertheless, NCSU fans will complain because Morris credits North Carolina's Frank McGuire with creating the mystique of ACC basketball when he challenged Everett Case, won the conference's first of three NCAA

championships, and recruited in New York. This is a little like crediting the

Pilgrims with discovering America. Case brought big-time basketball to the

Southeast, but he is only slighted. Norm Sloan, whose team won the 1974 NCAA championship, three ACC

championships, and remains the only team to go undefeated for two consecutive years in conference play, is ignored. Winning nine straight games from Coach Dean Smith made Sloan persona non grata for life with the Chapel Hill faithful.

Conference champions are determined by the tournament. The author creates something called "the regular season championship," and UNC

hangs banners claiming it. It does not exist.

Every NCSU fan will spot these and other slights. The fans from the other conference schools will find even more. Nevertheless, there are excellent features on Maryland's recruitment of Tom McMillen, Castleman D.

Chesley and television in the ACC, and a reference section on every season

through 1988. This book will delight fans, instantly create arguments, and provide

season records to settle disputes.

North Carolina State University

William H. Beezley

THE NORTH CAROLINA HISTORICAL REVIEW

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