A Stitch in Time – 15 of Them, in Fact

Longtime trainer Herman Bunch treating the gash in David Thompson's scalp as Phil Spence looks on.(Photo courtesy of Phil Spence.)

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© Tim Peeler, 2020

Here's a story you may never have heard about legendary NC State All-American David Thompson, who turned 66 yesterday.

The day of the NCAA semifinal game against UCLA at the Greensboro Coliseum, Thompson was still recovering from the horrific fall he suffered six days before against Pittsburgh in the NCAA East Region Finals at Reynolds Coliseum.

He wasn’t fully recovered from that crowd-silencing spill, which had every Wolfpack fan worried not only about the game against the seven-time defending champion Bruins, but about Thompson’s ability to ever play basketball again.

He had suffered a severe concussion and had 15 stitches in the back of his head. He would have never made it through the current protocol to play in the game against John Wooden’s team featuring Bill Walton and Keith Wilkes.

In addition to the stitches, Thompson had a bald spot on the back of his head where his mini-Afro had been shaved while being treated at the old Rex Hospital near downtown Raleigh the day of his fall.

Thompson didn’t want to appear weak in his rematch with Walton and the rest of the dominant Bruins, who had handed the Wolfpack its only loss in two years earlier that season in St. Louis in a made-for-television showdown between two teams that had finished the 1972-73 season undefeated.

And he didn’t want to show up for what was then the most-watched game in the history of college basketball with a big bare spot on the back of his head.

“Here, David, I’ve got something for you,” said team trainer Herman Bunch, who told me this story at a North Carolina Sports Hall of Fame press conference honoring the 1974 championship team and confirmed by Thompson a year or so later.

Thompson sat down and Bunch fiddled around with something behind him and a black magic marker. When Bunch finished, Thompson looked in the mirror and gave his approval.

In the biggest game of his life, during one of the greatest performances of his career (28 points, 10 rebounds), in the game that NC State ended UCLA’s stranglehold over college basketball, David Thompson had a black-painted sponge glued to the back of his scalp, covering up the place where his head had been split open the week before.

Two nights later, the Wolfpack beat Marquette for the first team national championship in school history.