Tyler Hansbrough wills the ball back to him.

Oh basketball….how much have I missed thou? 

Basketball is back in gear here in ACC land. I have been to two games so far at UNC. A couple I had to miss due to travel committments, or being previously booked for work. I am also missing their game on Thursday. The Thursday game has special significance because Tyler Hansbrough could break the UNC all-time points record. So imagine how bummed I am to miss that game. But such is my luck. 

Here though find some pictures from the two most recent games that I have photographed:

UNC Asheville vs. North Carolina Basketball photos (11/30/08)

Oral Roberts vs. North Carolina Basketball photos (12/13/08)

UNC head coach Joe Breshi on the cover of Lacrosse Magazine.

US Lacrosse, which is the governing body of lacrosse in the United States, commissioned me to do a portrait and ‘action’ shots of new North Carolina head coach Joe Breschi.  I did the shoot in two days.  The first day entailed coming out to a practice, and getting photos of coach in action.  Essentially, I stalked coach around during the day.  Keeping up with him during practice is probably harder than it sounds.  He is going back and forth do the different groups (offense and defense split up during practice).  

Then a few days later, coach and I barely found 15 minutes on a Sunday to get together and do a portrait out by the Old Well.  I saw barely because as the deadline for US Lacrosse approached, coach was very busy with alumni weekend activities.

I am embarassed to say that the ACC championship was my first soccer game in a year.  That is mostly due to most soccer games these days being at night.  Night games, with the poor lighting they bring, are typically not work going to.  But my old friend Greg Fiume, who is the Maryland Terrapins team photographer, hired me to photograph Maryland as they played for the ACC championship against Virginia.  So below and enjoy the goods.

Maryland soccer vs. Virginia photos

Mark Staines spots Andrew Spyke. Look at all those plates.

I’m not working with the team as much as I did last year, but I have to admit, I do miss my time with them. So yesterday I went out to one of their weightlifting session. I’m a little embarrassed that I’ve only learned about half of the freshmen’s names so far. Last year, by the 2nd week of September, I had everyone’s names down. But today I had fun and enjoyed being around the team again and I’m getting all the names down. Treat of the day was strength and conditioning coach Melissa Glyptis giving us a preview of her Halloween costume.

Last year I never posted galleries of these behind-the-scenes, as I was hoarding all the photos until I put them into a book. But this year, since I’m not doing a large project, I’m okay releasing them. So here is a link to a gallery of pics from today.

Billy Bitter

I might be only like seven months late posting this, but I have uploaded photos from the April 2008 matchup of UNC lacrosse vs. Hofstra. At the time, I got sidetracked and until last night didn’t realize had not posted the photos. So here is the link so your life will be complete.

Cover of 2009 ACC Basketball Handbook

The cover of this year’s ACC Basketball Handbook features North Carolina’s Tyler Hansbrough in a photo taken by me when UNC played Wake Forest.  Always nice to get your work on the cover of a magazine. (and pay the bills too)

Also inside are a good number of my photos used for a story on Duke’s Coach K.   You can find a copy in many bookstores, or you can order online.

This reminds me…this is going to be the last year of Tyler.  That is hard to believe.  The last 3 years with him flew by.

Also inside are some fantastic photos by basketball photographer extraordinaire Bruce Schwatzman and some writings from various authors including Tim Peeler at NC State.

UNC head coach Joe Breschi

If you are lacrosse fanatic like me, then you know that this summer, Joe Breschi was hired to be the head coach of the North Carolina men’s lacrosse team.  Before UNC, coach Breschi was at Ohio State University, quietly but quickly building a solid program.  However, it is UNC that coach Breschi calls home, having graduated from UNC in 1990.

Before coming to UNC, I did not know much about coch Breschi, but I had the feeling that his players really liked him.  But now, having met him, I can see why he is “a great coach but an even better person”, as senior Bobby McAuley said it so well to Inside Lacrosse.

Lacrosse Magazine (the publication of US Lacrosse) commissioned me to do a portrait of coach Breshi, as well as to get some “action photos” of him.  The portraits haven’t been done, but I am not going to post them here anyway until after US Lacrosse uses them.  I don’t want to usurp their publication.  But here in this posting are some action photos.

Last year, I obviously attended a lot of practices.  I do mean, a lot; so I know what they were about.  Going out Friday showed me how much the UNC program is turning around under Breschi’s tenure.  The practices were intense, but I could tell the guys were having a lot of fun.  One new thing this year is that jersey numbers are not automatically given out.  Players have to earn the right to have a number.  Until then, your practice jersey is blank.  I spoke with Emmit Kellar and he echoed my thoughts:  This new system creates a great sense of competition among the players.  As I understand it, numbers are given out on a “first earned, first served” basis. If you want to reserve your number, you have to prove yourself during practice that you deserve it.

When I went out, Bobby McAuley earned his number on this day,  and you can obviously see the excitement.

Bobby McAuley earns his jersey number

Russell Wilson with "Trust" written on his wrist bandage

Oh, I wish every game at NC State was like this for me.  To be sure, working at NC State covering football has had it’s ups and downs.  When Daniel Evans threw the “hail mary” 2 years ago to beat Boston College:  That was euphoric.  But for every good moment, there seems to be even more bad ones.  Traveling to USC with the team was an exercise in masochism.  Insult to injury was Russell Wilson’s concussion that put him in the hospital overnight.  But back to the point:  It is a lot more fun to work for and photograph a team that wins than one that doesn’t.

Today was one of those good days.  In what turned out to be an exciting game, North Carolina State upset East Carolina (ECU).  Some fans may dispute the use of “upset”, saying that ECU was not as good as they were thought.  But, in the end, NC State did beat a ranked team.  Here are some of my photos from the game.

You know how I like random photos, and the photo in this posting is both random, and one of my favorite photos from the day.  It is of NC State QB Russell Wilson.  Actually, it is a close up of his hands during the press conference.  I noticed his wrist taped with the word “Trust” written on it.  After taking a few photos of it, a reporter asked what the message meant.  Russell said it means “Trust in God first. Then trust in your teammates.”  Anyways, I hope Russell wasn’t wondering why I was zooming in on his pelvic section.

So college football season has started, and I am back in full force on the sports photography circuit.  Last week I traveled on the team buses down Columbia, SC with the NCSU Football team when the played the Ol’ Ball Coach.

It goes without saying that with a final score of 34-0 for South Carolina, it was a rough game.  Worse though was the injury of QB Russel Wilson.  I was walking around USC campus with Brandon in athletic communications saying that with all the injuries, the only thing that could be worse if if Wilson was hurt.

Beyond the score and injuries, I had a great time down in Columbia.  Brandon and I toured the campus and I was able to by my always essential survenior for every campus I visit: a shot glass.  I also had a great talk with team orthopedic surgen Dr. David Fajgenbaum, whose son, also named David, I’ve known back when I worked at Georgetown and David QB’ed there.

The enviroment was also a fun one.  The fans certainly get into the game, and it was loud there.  I can only imagine the intensity that comes from a Clemson - USC game.  I did hear that the NCSU fans said the USC fans were welcoming and respectful, which was great to hear.  Good to have an intense, but cordial enviorment.

Speaking of enviroment, one of my favorite photos was of Andre Brown, just as the team was about to enter the field.  He was checking out the stadium, and I was only about 2 feet from him when I took the photo.

Wednesday, with the help of my friend Danny, I did the team photo for NCSU men’s basketball.  Usually it is one of my more stressful events of the year, but this year it went off without much of a hitch.  Brian Reinhardt, media relations director for basketball, had the day’s events remarkably organized, arriving with a diagram of where each coach and player would sit or stand.

We also did some photos for marketing.  They needed some photos of Ben McCauley, Courtney Fells and Brandon Costner.  In a light hearted moment, I snapped them doing a faux pose before we did the real photo shoot. (sorry it is not composed very well; I brought my camera up from the floor and snapped this moment real quick)  Moments like these are great because they remind you that these guys are just every day guys like you and me who have a sense of humor, and I think most fans would really appreciate that.

Trevor Mack

Every August, I pack my lighting gear and head to NC State to set up for a two-day head shot day.  All the winter and spring athletes come in anytime between 9am and 4pm to have their photo take.  Staff are also welcome to come.

Typically I do both days, but travel with football to South Carolina precluded me from doing the Wednesday session.  So my friend and fellow photographer Karl Deblaker filled in on Wednesday.  On the first day, I was getting a couple outtakes and Pat Norris in the media relations office suggested that we keep a collection of all the outtakes on file, and post them to the new blog on gopack.com.  So I wanted to link you to the blog so you can check out the outtakes.

Hopefully this is something we can do on an annual basis.  We thought the fans would get a kick out of the photos.