Visiting the White House has always been considered a great honor for a championship winning team. Going to the nation’s capital and having your achievements recognized by the leader of the free world and the rest of the country was the kind of experience you’d never forget. It’s still the kind of experience you’d never forget, but not it a good way. That’s why teams are saying “thanks, but not thanks.”
The invitation to the White House was, ehm, “withdrawn” from the NBA Finals Champion Golden State Warriors after their apparent reluctance to visit with President Donald Trump.
On Saturday, we learned of another team championship winning basketball team that won’t be making the trip Washington D.C. to visit the Prez. The Charlotte Observer is reporting that the North Carolina Tar Heels don’t feel the compulsion to be “honored” by President Donald Trump.
Publicly, UNC has chalked up their absence to an inability to find a date that works for all parties involved.
A scheduling conflict is keeping the team from visiting the White House. Comments made earlier this year by coach Roy Williams might be more telling, though.
“It used to be much more so than I think it is now,” he said then. “Now everybody’s has got social media, and we don’t need The New York Times to find out what in the dickens is going on in the country. You know, our president tweets out more bulls**t than anybody I’ve ever seen. We’ve got social media.”
