Kennedy Meeks drops the weight, keeps the flair

Kennedy Meeks likes to make people laugh, and he likes to smile, and these two things are related, so Kennedy Meeks is happy.

Like at this year’s Late Night With Roy. Meeks, a forward on the North Carolina men’s basketball team, took the mic at midcourt and made an announcement.

“I will be singing ‘I Will Always Love You,’ by Whitney Houston,” he told the crowd, and right then it was possible to see every single one of Meeks’ teeth, such was the magnitude of his grin.

“Why did you look at me when you said that?” host Bobby Frasor asked.

Meeks opened his mouth to say something, leaned over to the microphone. No words emerged, so there stood Meeks, speechless and smiling.

What followed, of course, was one of the more memorable Late Night skits, with Meeks passionately lip-syncing the Grammy-winning love song, falling to his knees histrionically, then laying on his back on the court. He never broke a smile.

That’s Meeks: a 6-foot-9 sophomore from Charlotte who loves to keep his teammates loose.

“Loose? What does loose mean?” Meeks asks after UNC’s 112-34 exhibition win against Belmont Abbey on Friday.

Like, unworried, not uptight.

“Oh, yeah. Yeah,” Meeks says. “That’s the most important part about it.”

It’s settled, then: Meeks, who had 14 points on six-of-seven shooting in 12 minutes Friday, is a smiling motivator.

That’s it? A big goofball? No. Meeks is more.

He’s a graceful giant, a big man with a soft touch both around the rim and away from it. He shot 55 percent from the field last season and started 50 percent of games. He averaged about eight points and six rebounds a game. Now, he’s a breakout candidate, a player many expect to solidify UNC’s ever-evolving frontcourt this season.

Why? First, a story.

Meeks smiled after he proved them wrong. They had said he couldn’t windmill. So there he was, wearing a tight-fitting black tank that paraded a newfound chiseled frame, throwing down a windmill at a Charlotte gym this summer.

He smiled, but not that smile.

Not the one from Late Night, not the one splashing his face when he’s excitedly whipping a towel on the ground, watching his teammates from the bench.

No, this smile was different.

It was more a “Yep, I just did that” smirk, a gesture that cemented the emergence of the new Kennedy.

“This one is for the people who said I couldn’t windmill,” reads the caption to his Instagram video of the dunk, followed by nine emojis, three of them smiley faces.

The new Kennedy is a fitter Kennedy, 50 pounds lighter and one year wiser.

“It’s something I’ve been working on for a long time,” Meeks, listed at 270 pounds but closer to 266, says of cutting weight. “It’s finally paid off.”

“Physically, the changes that he’s made is making him a more explosive player,” said Coach Roy Williams.

“I’m really proud of what he’s done. It takes a lot for him to be able to lose that much weight in a year’s time,” junior forward Brice Johnson says.

“He’s a lot more explosive than he was last year. And hopefully, he’ll have a lot more dunks than Marcus (Paige) this year.”

The new Kennedy has not, however, lost his charm. He still adheres to the same philosophy.

“No matter if we were to lose a game, just keep smiling,” Meeks said.

sports@dailytarheel.com