Note to readers: I’ve got a great job. I get to go to sporting events for free, sit in great seats and write about what I see. If you love to write and don’t mind weird hours, it’s wonderful. Nevertheless, it is a job, and I’ve sat through many a boring blowout that really felt like work. This college basketball game didn’t. Although the stakes were low, it was one of the most purely enjoyable events I’ve ever attended. Copyright 2003 The Charlotte Observer All Rights Reserved Charlotte Observer (North Carolina) December 21, 2003 WORDS, NOT EVEN 233, DO IT JUSTICE By SCOTT FOWLER, Staff Writer CHAPEL HILL, N.C. -- There was Wake Forest and North Carolina pounding at each other in what was undoubtedly the greatest regular-season ACC game ever played and there was triple overtime and a 119-114 Wake Forest win and there was Chris Paul pointing at Raymond Felton and then shouting to the world "He can't guard me" and there was Felton coming back and nearly breaking the ankles of three Wake players on a drive and there was Roy Williams laughing in wonder and admiration, turning into a fan for a second, when five players sprawled on the floor during a loose-ball scrum and there was Skip Prosser calling it the best game he has been involved in as a coach and there was Woody Durham sounding like he was at a funeral in the postgame news conference and there was Eric Williams crying like he was at one, too, when the Wake center made the two free throws that finally won the game and there was a man dressed in a baby blue Santa Claus suit who looked as hideous as the overall free-throw shooting and there was not a reindeer but Santa Claus would not have left anyway because no one left and there was Erskine Bowles in a front-row seat at the Dean Dome smiling like it was a good thing he lost that Senate race because otherwise he could not have seen this game. The above sentence contains 233 words - one for each point scored in the best basketball game I have ever seen in person. I hope it makes you feel a little like Saturday afternoon felt in the Dean Dome, where everything seemed rushed and strange and, most of all, incredibly fun. I know you can't put too much weight on any college basketball game in December. But this one turned into one of those endless pages in the Bible where the "begats" all run together and pretty soon it's really hard to tell whose great-grandfather belongs to whom. One overtime begat another. One awful free throw begat another. One great play begat another. Everyone got exhausted and exhilarated and depressed several times during three hours of the most entertaining basketball the ACC has ever seen. The best thing about this joyous game was that no one really has to go home. North Carolina and Wake Forest have just begun their seasons, even though this seemed like a game in March. That's a good thing, since both teams are committed to playing like those wonderful 100-point ACC teams of the 1970s played (with better defense). The worst thing about the game is that after it's over, you realize you just saw the best game of the season. It's almost certain nothing will top that. You'd need a Duke-Kentucky finish to do it, and those come along, what, every 10 years? Both teams had numerous chances to end it. North Carolina's Rashad McCants had two free throws with North Carolina ahead 106-104 in the second OT with 35 seconds left. He missed them both, Wake's Eric Williams scored inside and it went to overtime No. 3. McCants led North Carolina with 25 points and hit 4-of-5 three-pointers. Naturally, down 117-114 with 15 seconds left at the end of the third overtime, Roy Williams set up a play for McCants to come off a Jawad Williams screen and shoot a three. "And then it all broke down," McCants said. "No screen. No shot." Guarded well, McCants passed to Felton, who was stripped of the ball. Wake Forest's Williams hit two free throws and that was finally it - 119-114, Wake Forest. The North Carolina fans filed out into the cold, ridden hard and put up wet, full of a game unlike any they had ever seen.