c. 2000 Religion News Service

(Tom Ehrich is a writer and computer consultant, managing large-scale database implementations. An Episcopal priest, he lives in Durham, N.C.)

(UNDATED) Crow is the preferred diet in North Carolina this week.

Or so hope University of North Carolina basketball players and their most diehard fans.

The Tar Heels had just begun their victory dance in Austin, Texas, last Sunday (March 26) after defeating Tulsa and advancing to the Final Four, when the university’s radio announcer told those who had criticized the team earlier in the season, “Keep it to yourselves.”

One player blasted fair-weather fans for losing faith in the team. Another said fans’ criticism of his regular-season play meant “they don’t like me as a person, they just like me when I’m winning.” The attitude seemed to be: If you criticize us when we’re losing, you have no right to applaud us when we win.

Oh?

We weren’t supposed to notice that this talented team meandered its way to a 13-loss season, drifting out of the Top 25 and being awarded an eighth seed in the NCAA tournament mostly for old time’s sake and the long-shot hope of TV ratings?

We weren’t supposed to notice when they played like high school hot dogs working on their personal highlight films for the pro draft?

What did those four consecutive midseason losses mean except that the team was playing poorly?

I don’t want to overstate the players’ post-victory gloating. They did win, and one privilege of victory is to cut down the nets. Besides, I have a son at Carolina, and he’s as happy as the next Heel.

But this whining about fair-weather fans reminds me of 30 years ago, when the refrain was “My country, right or wrong.” And the chant “Love it or leave it” meant: Love this war or you don’t belong. Critics of the Vietnam War could never get it across that it was patriotism that fed their zeal. It was love of country and many happy choruses of “America the Beautiful” that led them to oppose a war that, in their opinion, endangered the nation’s future.

Many believe that the Big Victory outweighs all else. I think of men who beat their women, then go out and buy them extravagant gifts and say, “See, I really do love you.” Or alcoholics who believe a grand gesture _ a big sale, an expensive vacation, a burst of family zeal _ will overcome a thousand nights of abuse.

The notion that we should be honored for our potential and not held accountable for our performance reminds me of the sad souls who regularly recite their college entrance examination scores as a Teflon protection against failure.

How many “stars” explain away the collapse of their personal lives by pointing to a trophy? How many notorious sinners buy the cultural myth that a death-bed confession or a last-minute mega-gift to the church will atone for a lifetime of greed and cruelty?

The stark reality that behavior has consequences might be the most difficult lesson that parents teach their children, schools teach their students and employers teach their workers. Accountability is an act of love, not a sign of rejection. Protecting someone from consequences isn’t love; it’s laziness and self-protection. If we define love as adulation, we’re sitting ducks for the flatterers. If we encourage our children to blame “bad teachers” for their poor grades, we set them up for lifetimes of failure.

In sports, victory in the last lap does win the race, and if Carolina pulls off a championship in Indianapolis, no one will remember a lousy season. But even in sports, fans have a right to boo bad play. And, to an extent that the players probably don’t want to see, it was those boos that led them to dig deep, put aside the fancy dribbling and play as a team.

This is Carolina, after all. If a small-college team of walk-on players and future accountants loses 13 basketball games, no one notices. But when a team of talented athletes _ recruited into one of the nation’s most vaunted programs, loaded down with Nike gear, allowed to pay less than normal attention to their studies _ when they sleepwalk through a mediocre season, there are consequences.

The way to change those consequences isn’t to demand loyalty. It is to play better.

DEA END EHRICH