The Triangle Tarheels Basketball Club fifth-grade girls basketball team completed its AAU season with 30 wins and three losses and earned a place in the Amateur Athletic Union Division 1 National Tournament to be played June 26-July 1 in Hampton, Va.

"We're really excited about that," coach Amad Smalls said Monday night.

To help pay for trip expenses, the team, which place third in the state tournament to take one of four qualifying spots for nationals, is conducting fundraising activities, including mother-daughter and father-daughter tournaments this weekend, and accepting donations, Smalls said.

With more than 10,000 youth swimmers on 78 teams this summer, the Tarheel Swimming Association long ago outgrew any single season-ending championship meet.

These days, four meets give the recreational summer league's swimmers a chance to experience a multi-team, championship-meet atmosphere.

Although the four meets being held this weekend and next in Raleigh and Cary are conducted by Wake County club teams and not the Tarheel Swimming Association, TSA teams are the invited participants.

Mention the words "college" and "basketball" and "national
championship" together around here, and most people naturally assume
you're talking about the Triangle's well-known varsity programs.

But basketball is played at the recreational level on college campuses,
too, and a team from N.C. State produced a national championship this
past weekend.

The N.C. State Wolfpack Men's Club Team won the American Collegiate
Intramural Sports National Championships basketball tournament played
Friday through Sunday on the Raleigh campus.

Pat Brogden of Garner overcame tough, windy conditions to win her fifth
major Carolinas Golf Association championship on Wednesday.

Brogden shot a 3-over-par 75 on Wednesday for a 147 total and the
championship of the seventh North Carolina Women’s Senior Amateur
Championship.

The victory at Cedarwood Country Club in Charlotte came by four strokes over the defending champion, Melissa Sage of Charlotte.

See photos from UNC's national championship win and the Franklin Street celebration. News & Observer staff photos.

Postgame comments and highlights from Duke's ACC Championship win against Florida State Sunday in Atlanta. (Staff video by Travis Long)