One of UNC basketball’s most valuable members doesn’t play or coach.
During a timeout early in the first half North Carolina’s game against Virginia Tech on Tuesday, Doug Halverson stood outside the Tar Heels’ huddle and watched as Roy Williams tried to coach his team to a win.
Halverson, wearing a Carolina blue vest, clapped his hands in encouragement.
It is these times when Halverson isn’t treating anyone that he says he’s most nervous. He can sometimes get lost in the game.
But when a player gets injured a few minutes later, Halverson springs into action. Senior guard Christian Keeling turned his left ankle and had to be taken back to the locker room to be treated. He returned later in the second half.
Treating injured players throughout the season is common for Halverson, who serves as UNC basketball’s head athletic trainer. But this season has been more strenuous than normal.
Entering the ACC tournament, 11 UNC scholarship players had missed 98 games due to injury and illness, which was the most in the Roy Williams era. The previous high was 64 during the 2008-09 season. That number will increase as long as UNC remains alive. A few players are out for the season.
Keeling is the only key rotational player who hasn’t missed a game, and his status is certainly in doubt Wednesday.
“It’s just kind of felt groundhog day like,” Halverson said in a recent interview with The News & Observer. “There was a period there, where it felt like every day I was walking in with a new issue, or a new injury that we were trying to manage.
“So you’re always trying to feel like you’re getting your head above water, and as soon as you feel like you’re making progress, something else happens.”
The injuries and illnesses the Tar Heels have dealt with have come at significant times and stretches during UNC’s 2019-20 season. It’s a big reason why the Tar Heels have struggled so much. They’ve lost 18 games this year, the second-most in program history and came into the tournament as the 14-seed. That was a first.
Freshman guard Cole Anthony missed 11 games after having a procedure done to treat a partial tear in his meniscus. Senior guard Brandon Robinson has missed nine games for different injuries, including neck pain from a car accident in January. Junior forward Garrison Brooks has been scratched in the right eye three times, and came down with a sudden illness that kept him out of UNC’s game against Louisville last month. Freshman guard Anthony Harris tore his ACL in December and has not played since.
Armando Bacot missed a game because of a sprained ankle.
“It’s crazy just like the hours he put in,” Bacot said. “I remember when I first got hurt against Ohio State. It was like his off-day and he was with me for six or seven hours. It’s kind of crazy the hours he puts in. I feel like it goes unappreciated because people don’t see it because it’s behind closed doors.”
Behind the scenes
Halverson has been the basketball program’s athletic trainer since 2013. He has one of the behind-the-scenes forces for the Tar Heels, and is essential to their success. When an injury occurs during a game, he has to treat it fast. He’ll first determine whether a player is healthy enough to return to play, and if he is, he’ll do everything he can to get the player comfortable enough to return.
That player, if crucial enough, can be the difference in a tight game.
When former Tar Heels guard Joel Berry suffered an injury during the first round of the NCAA tournament in Greenville, S.C. in 2017, Halverson and strength and conditioning coach Jonas Sahratian treated him every day, Halverson said. Berry was one of the Tar Heels’ best players, and they worried that his injury was too serious to play through.
After hours of treatment, Berry wasn’t getting much better. So they took an hour and a half drive to see one of his friends, a chiropractor in Charlotte, to treat Berry in between games.
“Part of my job is also knowing who can do it better, and who it is that can support me,” Halverson said.
The treatment worked. And Berry was able to play. He won the Final Four’s Most Outstanding Player award, and helped the Tar Heels win the 2017 national championship.
This time of the year is always the busiest for Halverson. He says he is working around the clock, seven days a week.
“Sunday will be a day off but it will be a treatment day,” Halverson said last week. “So even on days off, it’s always a misnomer for us. I’m always in on days off to treat our injuries to help take advantage of that rest day and make sure people are getting better, so that when we come back to the next practice day, we are in a better spot than we were.”
Before UNC’s home finale against Wake Forest last week, Brandon Robinson said he went to Halverson to get treatment on his sprained ankle at 10 a.m. in hopes that he would be ready for his final game at the Dean Smith Center.
The game started at 7 p.m.
Robinson scored 18 points and the Tar Heels beat the Demon Deacons 93-83.
“For me personally, I wouldn’t be out there night in and night out,” Robinson said. “I be feeling terrible coming into some games, and (Halverson) gets me in a good spot, enough to get out there and just go play. This season wouldn’t be anything without him.”
Aside from treating players, he plans meals for road games and schedules appointments for guys to stay on top of injuries or manage current injuries.
In the morning, he texts with players to see how they are feeling and is responsible for giving Williams an update on their status later in the day.
“I’m sorry, he’s meant to so dadgum much,” UNC coach Roy Williams joked. “I wish I didn’t know his name. But no, he’s done a great job. He’s better than anybody I’ve ever had, and he’s had a load this year that’s just been beyond belief.”
Halverson says it’s a group effort between he, Sahratian, their assistants and the doctors on staff.
Challenging days
Halverson, a native of Winston-Salem, became interested in sports medicine at an early age. His mom, Roper O. Halverson, played basketball at Wake Forest from 1972-1976. She was Mary Roper Osborne while in school.
She became a nurse after graduating.
“I think my sister and I both saw her passion for sports and passion for athletics and passion for competition, so I think we both benefited from that upbringing,” Halverson said.
Halverson went to UNC from 1998 to 2004 where he got his undergraduate and graduates degree. He spent one year at Georgia State as its athletic trainer after he graduated, but has been at UNC ever since. He was the athletic trainer for the UNC football program from 2007 to 2013, where injuries and the seriousness of those injuries are far more common.
But Halverson said even the injuries in this basketball season were strange. Halverson said every time it seemed like the team was getting healthy, someone else would go down with an injury.
The Tar Heels have used 10 different starting lineups this year. They entered the ACC tournament relatively healthy.
But now Keeling injury is a cause for concern as the Tar Heels try to win five games in five days.
“So those are challenging days and challenging things to kind of keep getting off the mat and standing back up,” Halverson said. “That’s the thing we’re all trying to do. Whether that is coach Williams on the court, or Jonas in the weight room, or me in here with the injured guys, we’re all trying to move forward and be better than we were yesterday.”
This story was originally published March 11, 2020 at 12:19 PM.
