DONALD WILLIAMS, NORTH CAROLINA (1993)

Williams scored 25 points each in North Carolina’s semifinal victory over Kansas and its championship game triumph over Michigan.

He played two more seasons at North Carolina after that, though a shoulder injury hindered him his junior year. Will iams went undrafted and never played a game in the NBA.

But he did play professionally in several different countries and also had stints in the CBA and with the Harlem Globetrotters.

Williams now runs basketball camps and coaches the girls basketball team at Wakefield High School in Raleigh, North Carolina.

“All my life as a kid I dreamed of going to college and playing basketball, playing professional basketball and becoming a coach after that,” Williams said. “My life just lined up into that. The only thing I can say was bad was that I didn’t get drafted by the NBA. Outside of that, my basketball career was wonderful. I’m blessed.” ted to opening the games on July 24 — despite athlete training, qualifying events and games preparations being disrupted more and more by the virus outbreak causing the COVID-19 disease.

Criticism of the stance grew in recent days from Olympic gold medalists and by an IOC member last Tuesday, before Bach finally acknowledged an alternative plan was possible.

“Of course we are considering different scenarios,” Bach told the New

York Times in an interview late Thursday.

National Olympic committees in Brazil and Slovenia later called for a postponement to 2021. Norway’s Olympic body said it did not want athletes going to Tokyo until the global health crisis is under control.

The United States governing bodies of swimming and track — two of the three top- tier Summer Games sports — have called on their national Olympic officials to push for a postponement.

“There is a dramatic increase in cases and new outbreaks of COVID-19 in different countries on different continents,” the IOC

said. “This led the ( board) to the conclusion that the IOC needs to take the next step in its scenario-planning.”

“The ( board) emphasized that a cancellation ... would not solve any of the problems or help anybody.”

In a separate statement, Bach addressed athletes who wish to compete at the Tokyo Olympics. Of the 11,000 athlete places available in 33 sports, around 4,700 have yet to be allocated.

“Human lives take precedence over everything, including the staging of the games,” Bach wrote. “The IOC wants to be part of the solution.”

Any postponement of the Summer Games would impact the Tokyo Paralympics scheduled for Aug. 25- Sept. 6.

“As you can imagine, potentially changing the dates of the Olympic and Paralympic Games is a huge logistical challenge, and the IPC will support the IOC every step of the way,” the International Paralympic Committee said.

“Currently it is vital that everyone, including athletes, stay at home to help prevent the further spread of this horrible disease which is impacting the global community,” the Germany-based IPC said.