Donald Williams, a former McDonald's All-American, played four years for the Tar Heels. Williams is most remembered for his clutch shooting in the 1993 NCAA tournament. After completing five of seven [image-nocss] three-point attempts and posting 25 points in each of Carolina's Final Four matchups, Williams was named the most outstanding player of the Final Four and Carolina won the NCAA National Championship. He played 12 seasons professionally and is currently the assistant coach of the girls' basketball team at St. Mary's School in Raleigh, N.C.
Kangaroo Express welcomed fans with a red-carpet aisle leading to the Bean Street Coffee kiosk where they met Donald Williams and scored a point for UNC by purchasing a cup with the school logo. Williams autographed cups and other memorabilia and fans took pictures with him.
Williams is eager for UNC to trump arch rivals Duke and NC State to win The Pantry's Battle for Bean Street. If UNC sells the most coffee cups, it will secure the $20,000 grand prize donation from Kangaroo Express for the UNC Build a Block project, a student-led initiative committed to building 10 Habitat for Humanity houses for university and UNC hospital employee families in the 10 months of the 2010-2011 academic school year.
"The school spirit that drives the students of the UNC Build a Block project to put in hard work and long hours to help UNC employees is the same passion that will help them win the Battle for Bean Street," said Williams. "I want to see every Tar Heel fan from a 50-mile radius out here buying UNC battle cups and giving Carolina the push we need to win the $20,000."
From now until April 1, the Battle for Bean Street is a competition between rival Triangle-area ACC universities: the University of North Carolina, North Carolina State University and Duke University. Fans can purchase special university-branded Bean Street Coffee cups at Triangle-area Kangaroo Express locations. For every branded cup bought, the respective university will receive a point towards its team's total. The university with the most branded cups tallied by April 1, 2011, will earn a donation of $20,000 toward the charity of its choice.
Although all three schools are after the grand prize, Kangaroo Express will reward the two runners up with $5,000 each to be given to the charity of their choice. North Carolina State University is donating their winnings to the Kay Yow Cancer Fund and Duke University to the Duke Cancer Institute.
To show appreciation for Williams' support of the Battle for Bean Street, Kangaroo Express is donating funds for a scholarship for one player to play on the Donald Williams Basketball Academy Rising Heels AAU Team. The academy is a year-round commitment to kids through private lessons with Williams, camps, clinics and other activities.
Separately, more than 9,000 Duke fans will have a chance to prove they were present at college basketball's biggest rivalry on February 9, 2011, when the Kangaroo Express FanCam comes to Cameron Indoor Stadium.
Duke Athletics will ask Blue Devil fans to be in their seats by 8:45 p.m. prior to the tip of Wednesday's game versus rival North Carolina, because at that time an ultra-high-definition, five-billion-pixel panoramic image will be shot from Coach K Court.
This 360-degree image will capture the stadium in its entirety, and it takes between 3 to 5 minutes to shoot. Cameron Crazies will be able to "step inside" the panoramic image and look around, as if they were standing at the center of Coach K Court for a frozen moment of time just before the tip of the highly anticipated game.
The resolution is so high that fans will be able to zoom in to find themselves or friends, "tag" themselves in the photo, and share via email, Facebook and Twitter. Blue Devil fans can even cruise around Cameron to see who else was part of the 229th meeting of the most storied rivalry in college basketball.
Fans can follow updates onGoDuke.com and the Duke Athletics official Facebook page, and they will be notified as soon as the picture is available for "tagging" on Thursday afternoon.
Following the game, fans will have the ability to purchase this one-of-a-kind panoramic photo from the Duke Photo Store, powered by Replay Photos. Fans will also be offered the opportunity to place their picture on the scoreboard at Cameron Indoor Stadium and purchase as a print, custom framed photo or photo on canvas.
Duke is the first college program to use this technology and offer this interactive photo to its fans and season ticketholders. The Pittsburgh Steelers, the Indianapolis Colts and the Boston Celtics have offered the FanCam experience to their respective fan bases. Most recently, the Pittsburgh Steelers FanCam captured the crowd at Heinz Field before the AFC Championship game on January 23, 2011.
Click hereto see an example of the Steelers FanCam.
Headquartered in Cary, N.C., The Pantry is the leading independently operated convenience store chain in the southeastern United States. As of December 6, 2010, the company operated 1,672 stores in 13 states under select banners, including Kangaroo Express, its primary operating banner.
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