Carolina Alumni Review - May/June 2007

ment where a tight-knit sense of brotherhood is not just commonplace — it’s inevitable. Competitors, teammates, gentlemen, brothers — this is Darkside.”

Junior Mark Confroy, who was randomly assigned room 316 his freshman year, said one wing on the third floor has unofficially become designated for members of the team in recent years.

“Originally, only room 311 was passed on, but over the past couple of years other players luckily happened to get other rooms in that corner of the hall,” he said. “For example, 310 has been passed down for three or four years now.”

At the beginning, Confroy didn’t realize what he was getting into.

“I was planning on trying out for the team before I even knew where my dorm was going to be and, even funnier, I didn’t realize that I lived next to the senior leaders and one of the captains — Elliott Murray [’05] — until I got to the actual tryouts,” he said.

After making the team and deciding to stay in room 316 through his sophomore

year, Confroy said new Darksiders received residence in rooms 311 and 310 after the seniors graduated.

“Now 311 is like the trophy room,”
Thomas said. “It’s where the disc bag lives.”

More undergraduates have been brought into the fold.

Before living in room 311 last year, Mat Thomas, a rising senior, slept in the space four or five nights a week as a freshman.

“It can be rowdy,” Thomas said. “There have been plenty of fights — even fist fights — but I’d rather live with my best friend than with someone who isn’t.”

Parrish, who now lives in Chapel Hill and works as an artist while coaching an Ultimate Frisbee team at McDougle Middle School, will have one of his Old East mates by his side as best man in the coming months.

The nature of living in such close quarters with friends you sweat and toil with day after day, enduring the highs and lows of competition, creates an atmosphere that is much different than that of a fraternity, Thomas said.

“You earn your way in by putting in the work, rather than putting up with a bunch of crap,” he said of the dorm and the team.

But as UNC’s master construction plan unfurls, the future of rooms continually passed down to the sport’s athletes stands in jeopardy. In the 2008-09 school year, Old East and Old West will be closed to correct problems that exist as a result of construction done in 1992, said Rick Bradley, assistant director of the department of housing and residential education.

“That would pose a huge problem on the little tradition we have going on,” Confroy said.

Housing officials said that in recent years they have been dealing more often with requests for group lodging.

“It’s a bigger issue for a club sport or a Greek group,” Bradley said. “It’s been a question in the last two years or so — can we live amongst our friends of any affiliation.”

While such allowances go beyond the housing department’s standard policies and

procedures, the nature of some requests merits bending rules, Bradley said.

He mentioned that the mothers of students on the men’s lacrosse team have called housing as a result of the Duke incident to request that their sons be housed together in a dorm throughout their four years to ensure security, insularity and control.

And in some situations it only makes sense, Bradley said, referring to housing members of the swimming and diving team together because their shared schedules, including late-night practices, help keep roommates on an even timetable.

But the Darkside case doesn’t yet have the makings of a formal policy change. The guys must continue to rely on their luck and savvy.

“When Ray [Parrish ’00] lived there, there used to be stadium seating in 311 to watch sports and play video games,” Thomas said. “That’s something that guys are always complaining about now.”

Taking couches from the dorm’s third-floor library and placing them in the elevator for comfortable hall-to-hall transportation also was pretty common, Dan Parrish said.

“As I drive down Cameron Avenue, I feel fortunate and proud to be able to show my friends and family where I lived,” Gill said. “The oldest state university building in America, a national historic landmark, the heart of UNC and, for three amazing years, my home.”

For those on the team who never had the chance to live in the time-honored space, “The Old Easy” still felt like where they were supposed to be.

“I never actually lived there, but from 2001 to 2005 I was a regular fixture,” said player Eric Kirkham ’05. “My drum set actually lived in room 310 my junior year — the resident adviser was particularly understanding.”