CHAPEL HILL — For all of his travels and innumerable interactions since his college playing days, through stops with six teams in the NBA and into 16 seasons now as a radio analyst, there are two basketball games that people mention to former North Carolina standout Eric Montross with the highest frequency.
The 1993 NCAA championship, when the Tar Heels topped Chris Webber, Jalen Rose and Michigan’s immortal Fab Five to claim the national title, aided in the dying seconds by Webber’s infamous call for a timeout that the Wolverines didn’t possess.
The other is an Atlantic Coast Conference regular-season meeting from Feb. 5 1992, anything but ordinary and straight from the dog-eared pages of the Duke-North Carolina rivalry, complete with its own searing title — Bloody Montross.
“I get a lot of comments about both,” he told the Burlington Times-News on Friday, “but arguably probably more about the ‘Bloody Montross’ game than the national championship.”
Such is the power that emanates across decades from that night at the Smith Center, which reaches its 30th anniversary with Duke’s visit to face North Carolina on Saturday night.
It’s the last game in Chapel Hill for retiring Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski, in his 42nd and final season in charge of the Blue Devils, and the first game in the rivalry for Hubert Davis as coach of the Tar Heels. Montross will be participating on the radio call of the game, alongside play-by-play man Jones Angell, his familiar partner with the Tar Heels Sports Network.
Thirty years ago, Duke featured what’s regarded as perhaps Krzyzewski’s greatest team, led by Christian Laettner, Bobby Hurley and Grant Hill. The Blue Devils had won the 1991 NCAA championship the season before and nine weeks later, would capture back-to-back national titles while finishing 34-2. They arrived in Chapel Hill in February 1992 unbeaten on the season, ranked No. 1 in the country, and having clicked off 23 straight victories since losing to North Carolina in the ACC Tournament final the previous season.
The ninth-ranked Tar Heels countered with the likes of Hubert Davis, then a senior guard, George Lynch and Montross, the sturdy 7-foot sophomore anchor around the basket, whose buzz cut and eventual gashed noggin came to distill an unforgettable picture of heated competition in the minds of countless spectators and television viewers.
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Twelve future NBA players, six on each team, were in the mix that night, and Hall of Famers squared off on the sidelines. North Carolina coach Dean Smith was five seasons shy of becoming the Division I all-time wins leader, the record Krzyzewski now holds with 1,188 career victories.
“It was an incredible game because you had tremendous talent out there on the floor,” Hubert Davis said Thursday, thinking back. “I remember Duke coming into the game undefeated at the time, and that the last time they had lost was against us in the ACC Tournament that previous year. And I remember that was the first time that fans stormed the Smith Center floor.”
Tar Heels supporters indeed staged a court-rushing celebration for the first time in the domed arena named in tribute to Smith. The baby blue building was 6 years old then. Montross, stitched up to close cuts on the side of his head and under his left eye, thrust his arms skyward at midcourt and roared and rejoiced.
“I think all that just kind of happened,” he told the Times-News on Friday. “You don’t know that it’s coming. But I mean, look, when you’re at home and it’s your fans, that’s pretty fun.”
Montross supplied 12 points, 10 rebounds and three blocked shots in North Carolina’s 75-73 defeat of Duke that night, while helping to hold Laettner, one of the great players in college basketball history, to a subpar showing of 12 points and 12 rebounds. Hubert Davis’s 16 points led the Tar Heels. Brian Davis’s 17 points paced the Blue Devils, whose air of invincibility had been punctured in that moment.
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Thirty years later, Montross remains the enduring namesake and battered poster boy from that night. Brian Davis’s mouth and teeth caught Montross over his right ear in the first half, blood pouring down the back of his head and neck, and sending Montross to get stitches.
“I think he was hungry,” he said of Brian Davis with a chuckle.
Montross still isn’t sure about the culprit for the slash on his face that appeared under his left eye in the second half. He said it might’ve resulted from knocking heads with Hurley or catching an unintentional elbow during a scramble for a loose ball.
The wound would require 10 stitches to close after the game, he said, but he was given just two stitches in order to hasten his return to the action. And so when he went to the free throw line with a bruise beneath his eye and a stream of blood trickling down his cheek, the arresting visual instantly attached an unforgettable illustration to the classic rivalry.
“What I’ve always believed is that it is an indelible image for a lot of people,” Montross said. “I think a lot of people associate the Duke-Carolina game as kind of a battle, and that one was actually a battle with the blood. It seems like people probably identified with that image, and it was one that really stuck out in their minds.
“And it’s been durable. It’s been a durable image, one that people continue to talk about. Not that it was terribly graphic, but I think when people see people bleed, well, we don’t see that every day.”
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Later, when the rivalry shifted to Durham and North Carolina played at Duke’s Cameron Indoor Stadium, a zany student fan among the famed Cameron Crazies showed up wearing a No. 00 Montross jersey — pulled over a full-on Frankenstein costume that included bolts on the side of the guy’s neck and oozing cuts on his forehead. Montross’s father, a former Michigan player, didn’t find the gag to be funny, but cooled considerably when the costumed college kid approached after the game genuinely seeking Montross’s autograph.
Montross delivered 15.8 points per game and 7.6 rebounds per game while shooting 61.5 percent from the field during the 1992-93 season, his junior campaign, as the Tar Heels claimed the NCAA championship by defeating Webber, Rose and the Fab Five in the title game.
Montross finished his four-year college career as a two-time All-American, earning a place as a beloved figure across the decorated eras in the Tar Heels’ rich tradition. He said it’s an honor to have remained so closely connected to the Duke-North Carolina rivalry in people’s minds through the many years.
“It’s a tribute to what I think is kind of the magic of college sports,” Montross said. “There’s a very strong following of folks who absolutely adore college sports, who follow their teams and are passionate. To be a visible marker for them of their passion and of their interest specifically in this rivalry, which is a national rivalry for sure, it’s very fun to be a part of, no question.
“And I think the other part of it is, when you win the game it’s really fun. I don’t think I would enjoy the memory nearly as much if we had lost. I know I wouldn’t have.”
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Tip-off
Who: No. 9 Duke (18-3, 8-2) at North Carolina (16-6, 8-3)
When: 6 p.m. Saturday (ESPN)
Where: Smith Center, Chapel Hill
Series: North Carolina leads 141-114, including 65-37 in Chapel Hill and 20-16 at the Smith Center. Mike Krzyzewski’s Duke teams are 49-48 all-time against the Tar Heels.
Up next: Duke plays host to Virginia on Monday night, the first of two meetings for the teams this month. North Carolina plays at Clemson on Tuesday night in the only meeting between the teams in the regular season.
Adam Smith is a sports reporter for the Burlington Times-News and USA TODAY Network. You can reach him by email at asmith@thetimesnews.com or @adam_smithTN on Twitter.
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This article originally appeared on Times-News: ‘Bloody Montross’ game endures 30 years later as unforgettable rivalry image for UNC, Duke
