One thing North Carolina fans can be proud of is there are always Tar Heels wearing USA jerseys at the Olympics, in a variety of sports.

This year is unique as there are no former Carolina men's basketball players on the roster -- coached by Duke's Mike Krzyzewski -- but that speaks to the nature of both players entering the National Basketball Association straight of high school and all that has happened with the UNC program in this decade.

As Roy Williams continues to recruit some of the finest players in the country, it's hard to imagine a UNC presence will not return to basketball again in a future Olympics not too far down the road.

This is one of the reasons we no longer call the sports outside of football and men's basketball non-revenue sports. These days they are known as Olympic sports, and many of them comprise the majority of the sports played at the Olympics.

Erin Donohue, Alice Schmidt, Blake Russell and Shalane Flanagan earned spots at the recent track and field trials. These current and former Tar Heels maintain what has become a strong tradition of Carolina performers and alumni making the U.S. team.

Another sport that will be heavily represented by UNC is women's field hockey. (Yes, there is men's field hockey, but it isn't played at UNC.)

Kate Barber, Rachel Dawson, Jesse Gey, Carrie Lingo, Amy Tran and Katelyn Falgowski are all former or current players at Carolina.

UNC is the reigning national champion in the sport, and some of these women played critical roles in claiming that precious title for the Tar Heels last fall.

Of course, no U.S. women's soccer team would be complete without some Carolina women. There have been as many as eight on some former U.S. teams. This year there are four.

Two of them, Heather O'Reilly and Lindsay Tarpley, already own gold medals from the last Olympics, which they won while still students at UNC.

Lori Chalupny and rising junior Tobin Heath are also members of the team.

"I've always loved putting on the U.S. jersey because you are not just representing not yourself, your family and the town where you are from," said Lorrie Fair, the youngest member of the 1999 U.S. Women's World Cup soccer champions in China, home to this year's Olympics, "you're representing your state -- I'm a proud Californian -- and your country on the world stage.

"Whether you choose to embrace it or not, you are given the status of an athlete ambassador. You can go on the stage and act like a total jerk, and that is how people will see your country. Or you rock everybody. You can be gracious in defeat and a humble winner. It's how you should act, and it's how I would want my kids to act."

While kids who sign to play football, baseball and basketball for Carolina dream mostly of playing professionally some day, the ultimate dream for these other athletes is playing on U.S. national teams, and they hope in an Olympic year.

There are, of course, other stages, such as the World Cup and World Championships. Fair said she can still recall standing on the stand with the gold medal draped around her neck and the national anthem playing in 1999 when the U.S. won the World Cup.

"All I remember was I was looking into the sky and you couldn't see any blue because there was so much confetti in the air," Fair said. "It completed covered the sky. It was really cool. I get emotional when they play the national anthem anyway. I just love it. I think it's just great.

"After we won the World Cup, I was just standing there trying to take it all in. But I don't think it really hit us until a couple of weeks later."

Many of these athletes train literally every day of the year. We should appreciate their efforts and applaud their achievements, particularly if they once wore or still wear a jersey back in the United States that says North Carolina on it.