by Charly Mann

In December of 1956 when UNC started their run for the National Championship, and the most incredible season in college basketball history, I was nearing my seventh birthday. The population of Chapel Hill was less than 8,000, and it seemed that every face in town was a familiar one. Woollen Gym, where the Tarheels played their games, held about 5,000 people, and I recall that almost anyone in town who wanted tickets to the games got them. Woollen Gym was twenty years old in 1957, and most of the bleachers were on rollers and could be collapsed and pushed away from the court when there wasn't a game. What made the season that year memorable to me at first, was that the first and last home games of the season were going to be against South Carolina teams. My Dad, then a math professor at UNC, was from South Carolina, and we visited relatives there often, so this was special to me. The first home game was against Furman in early December, and the last was against South Carolina – then in the ACC – in late February. During games I would spend much of time with a group of my friends walking up and down the bleacher stairs, and sitting from time to time in various empty seats. I cannot recall spending much time watching the games. UNC played eight home games that season, and won them all.

Coach Frank McGuire, with players Lennie Rosenbluth, Pete Brennan, Tommy Kearns, Joe Quigg, and Bob Cunningham

Everyone in town started paying a little more attention to the team after they won the ACC tournament and went on to the NCAA tournament. Most of those games I recall hearing on the radio. The national championship games in Kansas City are somewhat indelible for several reasons. First I found out that if UNC made it to the championship game they would probably be playing against a giant. I was curious to see a picture of this man, and saw in a newspaper he was black. This really surprised me. UNC had no black players, and did not have one until ten years later with Charlie Scott in 1966. In fact I do not recall any black students, or any blacks every attending any basketball games that year at Woollen Gym. My nearby elementary school, Glenwood, certainly had no black students. The following day I remember how excited everyone got when UNC won the NCAA semi-finalgame against Michigan State in triple overtime.

The next day all everyone in Chapel Hill was talking about was how there was little chance UNC could pull off another miracle. This was because the game was being played in Kansas, the home state of The University of Kansas that we would be facing that night. And also, of course , the giant, Wilt Chamberlain, who people were calling the best basketball player of all time was on the team we would be facing. This was going to be a battle of David and Goliath, and this Goliath was 5 inches taller than anyone on the UNC team. In fact he was eight inches taller than UNC’s best player Lennie Rothenbulth.

I remember my Dad remarking at the beginning of the game how the UNC coach, Frank McGuire, had chosen UNC’s shortest player, 5 foot 11 inch Tommy Kearns to match up with Chamberlain for the tip off to start the game. Of course Kansas won the toss, but just as amazingly, UNC jumped to a big lead which they maintained till halftime. The TV announcer explained that UNC had three of its players defending Chamberlain most of the game, which was working well for the Tarheels. The second half was awful for me, Kansas got the lead, and with less than two minutes left UNC’s star player, and leading scorer, Rosenbulth fouled out of the game. Then providence, or something that just never happens, began to happen. Kansas missed all of their foul shots in the final minutes, while UNC scored a basket and a free throw to tie the game up, so it was on to overtime. Next there were two overtimes in which each team played very slow and cautiously. In the first each team only got one basket, and in the second neither team scored. The real game was played in the final overtime, and there was lots of action, with both team scoring several baskets and free throws, and with about thirty seconds left, Kansas had a single point lead. In the last seconds I vividly remember a UNC player being fouled and making both free throws to give UNC the lead. Kansas had one final chance to score, and I held my breath, but somehow a UNC player got the ball that was being thrown to Chamberlain and UNC had done it, the national championship, with two triple overtimes, two nights in a row, and an undefeated 32-0 season.

Up until that time Chapel Hill was hardly on the national map, and I’m not sure if it was after the game, but from then on Chapel Hill had something to be really proud of and to remember. 
 

This is an authentic autographed photograph of the 1957 Championship team submitted by Francie Ellis. It was signed for her father, Fred Ellis.

These license plates were popular in Chapel Hill for at least a decade. I remember one displayed at the entry of Max Snipes’s Barber Shop on Franklin Street for years.

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