COLUMBIA, S.C. _ The NCAA press-conference moderator Friday night introduced Zion Williamson as Zion Williams, which left Williamson and RJ Barrett exchanging curious looks but also continued to prove there are no boundaries left unexplored when it comes to Williamson.
His NCAA Tournament debut earlier that evening was like that, 34 seconds of immediate impact followed by a sort of group Duke lethargy until halftime. Whatever everyone had come to see, paying hundreds of dollars on the street in some cases, that wasn't it.
And then it was.
It's easy to become jaded to some of the nonsense Williamson can concoct at times, the relentless procession of that's-the-best-one-yet plays becoming almost less impressive by the casual offhandedness with which they are accomplished.
And yet there are still moments where the most secure jaw is unavoidably dropped, and Friday's second half had a few of those. Three, really, each in increasing order of explosiveness.
First, the tomahawk hammer dunk of his own missed free throw after North Dakota State somehow lost track of the single most visible college basketball player of his generation in the lane.
Then, the breakaway where Williamson beat an opposing guard to a loose ball, dribbled behind his back while losing his balance and nearly falling to the floor, only to recover for a layup.
And finally, managing to jump higher in celebration of Barrett's reverse flush than Barrett did actually dunking the ball, Williamson seeming to levitate like a Warner Brothers character wearing rocket shoes. In the photos that went viral Friday night, he appears to hang in the air, floating, weightless. (Barrett did the same thing a while back on Williamson's 360 against Clemson, but without being preserved so elegantly for posterity.)
Every time you say, "Let's see him top that!" you find yourself saying it again four minutes later.
"God is good, and God gave him extraordinary ability but also extraordinary intelligence on how to use the ability and a work ethic to blend the two," Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski said.
Which brings us to Tacko Fall, the 7-foot-6 Central Florida center who is that rare player who can look down on the rim as Williamson does, thanks to his 13-inch headstart. Fall, in an interview with NCAA.com late Friday night after the Knights' victory over Virginia Commonwealth, declared that he would not allow Williamson to dunk on him Sunday.
"I won't allow him to put me on one of his highlight tapes," Fall said, and the experience of five months of watching Williamson would suggest the best way to do that is to step quietly out of his way, even for one of the tallest living humans currently walking the surface of the earth.
These have the potential to be the most famous of last words, if Williamson's college career to this point is any indication. When Durham's Jay Huff got hot in Cameron and started to feel that hometown vibe, Williamson's reaction was to throw down a dunk in Huff's face, over his extended arm, with his nondominant right hand. Huff had no advice to offer, nor did he think Fall would need any.
"He's big," said Huff, who at 7-foot-1 rarely runs into anyone taller, let alone 6 inches taller. "He knows what he's doing. From one big guy to an even bigger guy."
For his part, Williamson regarded Fall's proposition from a distance with a verbal shrug, as delicate a maneuver as anything he has accomplished on the court.
"What is he supposed to say?" Williamson asked. "Is he supposed to say he was going to let me dunk on him? He said the right thing."
Williamson has displayed that kind of preternatural self-awareness throughout this season in the spotlight, which is nearing closer to its end, whether that be Sunday night or five games from now.
There's a finite amount of Zion left, a player so exceptional the adjectives almost skew to the negative (Freakish! But in a good way!). A lot of people who have watched a lot of college basketball have never seen anything like him, and he won't be around much longer. What can he do in the time he has left he hasn't done already?
Williamson has shown the ability to twist the acknowledged bounds of basketball time and space into Mobius loops not thought possible, and if he does it again Sunday, Fall may end up on a highlight tape whether he likes it or not.
