Hubert West: "I Didn't Know It Was Possible"

Hubert West still remembers the bleachers in Salisbury.

"I was at a meet during the regular season," he recalls, "and my guidance counselor I saw sitting in the bleachers, sitting beside this gentleman — and to this day I don't know what his name was — but he was a doctor there in Salisbury that was a Carolina alumni."

West walked up through the stands. The man looked at him and asked a simple question.

"He said to me, 'I hear you like Carolina.' And I said, 'Yes, sir, I do.'"

What happened next changed his life.

"That was on a Friday afternoon," West says. "Monday evening, I got a call from Coach Joe. Wednesday evening, Coach Joe was sitting in my living room."

He pauses, still almost marveling at it.

"It was just amazing. Just to be here and just to be able to be a part of something — beginning at Carolina. It was just a dream come true because I didn't know it was going to be… that it was possible."

That word — possible — sits at the heart of Hubert West's story.

As one of the first two African American track and field student-athletes at North Carolina in the early 1970s, West stepped into an environment that was still evolving. He didn't arrive thinking about history. He arrived thinking about opportunity.

Years later, that opportunity would shift again — from competitor to coach.

"It was interesting going from being with teammates to then being the coach," West says. "It was pressure and it was exciting. It was something that I'll always remember."

He would go on to serve as an assistant and later as head coach — becoming the first African American head coach in Carolina Athletics history and a pioneer within the Atlantic Coast Conference. But in his telling, the focus isn't on the title. It's on the experience.

"Being able to work with the student-athletes that I worked with," he says, "being able to get the women's program started — it was sort of surreal, if you know what I mean."

At the time, he was focused on the work. On building. On mentoring. On competing. The significance would reveal itself more clearly with distance.

"And then here, years later, looking back through the history of the Atlantic Coast Conference and UNC, I see the significance of it now," West says. "And I understand it."

That reflection carries perspective, not self-congratulation. West speaks the way someone does when time has allowed the full weight of moments to settle.

"I always used to tell the athletes that no matter what others may think, what you believe and trust in yourself is going to be the key," he says. "In the long run, it's how you feel about yourself and who you trust in."

It's advice born from lived experience — from a young man who once stood in bleachers unsure if Carolina was even attainable, to a coach shaping programs and guiding student-athletes who would follow him.

The throughline is opportunity.

"I always tell people, take advantage of the opportunities that are given you," West says.

That message feels especially fitting now, as he is named a 2026 Tar Heel Trailblazer — an honor recognizing pioneers who paved the way for success in all aspects of the student-athlete experience.

For West, the recognition carries deep meaning.

"This is probably one of the greatest honors I could think of, of being associated with UNC," he says. "To be able to join the group of outstanding athletes that have been chosen before — to me, it's just an honor to be among that group."

There is gratitude in his voice. Gratitude for the counselor who made an introduction. For the coach who made a visit. For the university that opened a door he once wasn't sure he could walk through.
And perhaps most of all, gratitude for the chance to leave it more open than he found it.

Looking back now, West sees what others saw all along — that his presence mattered. That his leadership mattered. That the example he set expanded what future Tar Heels could imagine for themselves.

But he doesn't frame it that way.

Instead, he returns to the beginning. To belief. To possibility.

"I'm Hubert West," he says simply. "And I am a Tar Heel."

It's a statement that carries decades of meaning — from the stands in Salisbury to the track in Chapel Hill, from student-athlete to head coach, from opportunity received to opportunity created.

For Hubert West, being named a Trailblazer isn't about standing apart.

It's about remembering the moment when someone saw potential in a young athlete and decided to act — and understanding how far that single act of belief can travel.

University of North Carolina Athletics

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