Bears united in message and in mission
Thomas Hoffman, UNCBears.com
1/17/2021
Locked in arms and in lockstep with each other.
After a tumultuous summer that brought social justice issues to the forefront of nearly every conversation, athletes, coaches and staff from every sport dove headfirst into making sure when it came time to play, their voices and actions would be heard.
Though fans haven’t been allowed in the Bank of Colorado Arena yet this season, they may have noticed both men’s and women’s basketball locking arms during the national anthem. Each team also dons a custom-made shirt.
For men’s basketball, the front displays the word ‘Unity’ with the script “Hate is Taught, Love is Learned” on the back. And it was players like senior Rodrick McCobb who stepped into a leadership role during a critical time to help make decisions on what kind of a statement the team would make and why.
“Our conversations started in the summer after the shooting of George Floyd,” McCobb explained. “Coach [Smiley] had asked me ‘what can we do as a team?’ I also joined the BARS committee during that time and the discussions kept going from there.”
From day one, McCobb could feel he had the respect and most importantly, the attention of his teammates and coaches.
“Everyone on the team was pretty outspoken about how they felt, including the coaches,” McCobb said. “They just wanted to be heard like everybody else. The coaches kind of took us under their wings and understood what we were going through.”
By the time men’s basketball suited up for its first game of the season, dozens of other teams across a variety of sports had made their decisions of how they wanted to make a statement. Most surrounding the National Anthem, some teams chose to kneel, others remained in the locker room.
McCobb and men’s basketball once again relied on its open communication and trust with one another to arrive at a decision the entire team could respect.
I haven’t been on many teams like this. Not everybody has the same point of view but everyone on this team is on the same page regardless of skin color.Rodrick McCobb
It’s actually amazing. The university came up to me, asking what they thought they should do. I didn’t have to go and talk to them. To have the school, coaches and faculty coming up to you, understanding that there’s a problem going on. It’s amazing.
“We threw out a lot of different ideas at first – kneeling, crossing arms or just going in the locker room,” said McCobb. “We all had different opinions and what the National Anthem meant to each of us. Bodie [Hume] told me he had family members in the military and what the Anthem meant to him.
“Ultimately, we wanted to make sure we were all on the same page and still get the point across. I got with coach Smiley and asked him what he thought. We decided to lock arms so everyone could be a part of it.”
It was the trust and openness from McCobb’s teammates, coaches and the university that provided a positive platform for the team to make its statement of unity.
“I haven’t been on many teams like this,” explained McCobb. “Not everybody has the same point of view but everyone on this team is on the same page regardless of skin color.
“It’s actually amazing. The university came up to me, asking what they thought they should do. I didn’t have to go and talk to them. To have the school, coaches and faculty coming up to you, understanding that there’s a problem going on. It’s amazing.”
Similar sentiments were echoed from the women’s basketball team
“Our staff, our coaches and our administration have done a great job listening to our conversations,” said junior Alisa Wiggins. “Everyone wanted to be a part of the change. I think it’s awesome to be at a university that really accepts that and is wanting to make a difference.”
In a similar process to what McCobb and the men’s team went through, Wiggins and the women’s team took advantage of several zoom meetings when deciding what kind of statement the team wanted to make.
“We met a lot when more and more social injustices happened over the summer,” said sophomore Alecia Whyte. “We wanted to come together, find unity and find a way to be a positive change.”
Along with finding a common ground amongst one another, their conversations also open doors to learning a bit more about each other as teammates.
It makes you feel like you’re a family here at UNC. Everybody’s different but we all come together for the same goal.Alisha Davis
“A lot of people had different views and opinions,” explained Wiggins. “It was nice that we could find a common ground, learn about each other as human beings and find something that we all could do together in the ‘unity’ shirts.”
A simple, yet uniquely powerful message.
Each game, during each national anthem, the team stands as one, locked in arms with a t-shirt that reads one word – ‘Unity.’
“Even though we have our differences, we can still come together and be unified,” said sophomore Alisha Davis. “We want to accomplish a common goal and we should be able to do that outside of basketball as well.”
“I think it shows how much love and respect we have for each other,” Whyte said.
The actions of both the women’s and men’s teams may not be the loudest compared to others, but it’s been purposeful, meaningful, deeply personal and a strong united symbol of the values the student-athletes and the university represent.
“It makes you feel like you’re a family here at UNC,” Davis said. “Everybody’s different but we all come together for the same goal.”
