How a boy’s love for planes gave Clemson basketball its biggest fans
PJ Hall got down on one knee.
Clemson’s 6-foot-10 sophomore forward tucked a booted left leg behind him and presented nearly half a dozen pink- and peach-colored roses to the sub-5-foot Paula Grooms, then hugged her a few feet away from the loading dock at Littlejohn Coliseum on an overcast February day.
It was Grooms’ 80th birthday, and each player from the Clemson men’s basketball team presented her with at least one rose — for a grand total of 18 — gave her a hug, then boarded a bus bound for Atlanta. They were set to play Georgia Tech the next day.
For over a decade, Grooms has been at either the Littlejohn Coliseum loading dock or Anderson Regional Airport to send off and greet back the Tigers before and after every road game throughout the season.
Win or lose, she’s there.
Even the day after her birthday — with a pending dinner reservation to Earle Street Kitchen and Bar in her hometown of Anderson to celebrate her milestone year with her family — Grooms was at Littlejohn when the team bus arrived at 6:40 p.m. Her presence was welcomed after Clemson’s comeback bid against the Yellow Jackets had come up short 69-64.
“It wasn’t on you,” Grooms told Naz Bohannon, who was starting for an injured Hunter Tyson, right after telling Alex Hemenway, “I’m proud of you.”
She didn’t leave until everyone who got off the bus got a hug and some form of positive affirmation, including Gary the bus driver.
“I love her. We all do,” Tigers guard Al-Amir Dawes said. “Her consistency with love is just through the roof. It’s unspeakable. With her on our side, it’s a blessing because we don’t have that much fans that’s like that, that’s so committed like her. We love you, Paula Grooms.”
Over the past 14 years, Grooms has been a grandmother figure to the Tigers men’s basketball program. She always sees the team off and greets them back home during road trips.
Switch venues, rinse and repeat 10 days later when the team arrived after falling to Florida State in another close game 81-80.
As fate would have it, caring for her biological grandson is what caused her proverbial family to grow.
“My daughter Stacey said, ‘Mama, you have the worst case of empty nest (syndrome) I’ve ever seen,’ ” Grooms recalled. “She said, ‘You lost two children and you adopt a basketball team.’ ”
Always a source of support, Grooms will be there when Clemson takes off to New York for the ACC tournament. The Tigers are the 10th seed and play 15th-seeded NC State at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn.
Planes, trains and Clemson Tigers
In 2008, Paula and Franklin Grooms would pick up their 5-year-old grandson, James Austin Grooms, who goes by “Jag.” To keep him busy, the couple would look for activities to engage their grandson.
Jag always had a love for planes and trains — now an adult, he and his father, Brandon, still chase the occasional train. So, Paula and Franklin, who are Brandon’s parents, decided to take their grandson to the Anderson Regional Airport to watch the planes take off and land. It became such a habit that they caught the attention of the airport manager and fixed base operator lead technician, Steve Smith.
He would often let Jag check out the inside of planes and sit in the pilot’s seat. Going to the airport after school became routine: Jag would do his homework there then explore the aircraft.
One day, Smith came up to the Grooms family and informed them that Clemson’s men’s basketball team was about to take off for a road game if they wanted to watch.
As North Carolina natives, Paula and Franklin were N.C. State fans. They converted to Clemson after moving to the area in 1977, becoming men’s basketball season ticket holders and IPTAY members. Their kids, Brandon and Stacey, grew up fans of and graduated from Clemson.
That’s why accepting Smith’s offer was a no-brainer.
Paula just happened to have orange pom poms in her car, which she, Jag and Franklin used to cheer on the men’s basketball program.
“It just started from there, and they would let us know every time (Clemson) left the airport,” Jag said.
Right after the 2008-09 season, the Grooms couple was given the fan appreciation trophy by then head coach Oliver Purnell.
The ultimate fans
As Jag got older, he couldn’t make as many appearances at the airport for road games because he had school, homework or just couldn’t stay out too late.
“If I could, I’d take him out,” Brandon said. “If it was like a Saturday night or Sunday morning or something like that, I’d take him out there.”
Franklin doesn’t make the journey out anymore, but Paula has never stopped. If Clemson’s road trips are short enough to drive or long enough to require the team to fly out of Greenville, Paula pulls her white Toyota Venza — complete with an orange Clemson paw on both front doors, a smaller paw on her gas tank and a Clemson basketball sticker near the license plate — up to the loading dock at Littlejohn Coliseum for the goodbye and hello. When flights are short enough for departure from the Anderson Regional Airport, she’s there, too.
Year after year, the Grooms family became more familiar with and got to know the Anderson airport staff, the bus drivers and everyone associated with the Tigers’ men’s basketball team — from players and coaches to video coordinators and equipment managers.
Those bonds also earned Jag some cool points with his classmates in school. He became like a little brother to the players and had plenty of photos to prove it.
“It was definitely something to brag about,” Jag Grooms said of his newfound connections. “I’d show pictures whenever I had company.”
No reunion at Anderson Regional Airport was more thrilling than after Clemson’s 79-76 win over North Carolina on Jan. 11, 2020, the first-ever in Chapel Hill.
The Grooms family was eating at Fiesta Mexican Restaurant in Anderson while watching the game. Jag, then in high school, was working at the restaurant and would get updates through his family and on his phone.
After the game, the family — minus Jag, who was still on the clock — went back to Franklin and Paula’s house. Tornadoes were touching down throughout Anderson. One was within three miles of the Grooms’ home, but the rain was letting up and the Tigers were set to land at the airport soon.
No way Paula was missing this moment.
“All of a sudden, mom disappeared,” Brandon said. “(My fiance) Abi and I were cutting up downstairs with the kids. I was like, ‘She’s gone.’ I walked upstairs, she had her purse and she was going out the back door.”
Paula, Brandon, Abi, Stacey, her husband, Alex, and their son, Bryson bundled up and braved the torrential rain on the stormy, dark night to celebrate one of the biggest wins in Clemson men’s basketball program history.
“They were giggling and giggling and tumbling out of that plane,” Paula beamed. “You didn’t think about the storm. You didn’t think about, ‘I’m wet. I’m cold, I’m shaking.’ All you could think about was, you beat North Carolina. … It was one of those where before I died, I hoped they would do that, and they did it — thank goodness.”
In the fall of 2019, Bill Burton, who graduated from Clemson in 1977, and wife Lynne, who are longtime Clemson supporters, funded the men’s basketball players lounge and had it named after Paula and Franklin Grooms.
“Named in honor of Paula and Franklin Grooms for their unwavering support of Clemson Basketball and the players whose lives are forever enriched by their love,” reads a plaque placed on one of the walls in the lounge.
To the left of the plaque, “Clemson family” is painted in white on the wall with five photos of the Grooms, coach Brad Brownell and various players underneath.
“Just because of the uniqueness and the special people they are and what they do,” Brownell said. “It’s incredibly genuine. It’s very Clemson, so she means the world to us and our players.”
A year later, Paula and Franklin were named the Andy Balliet “Spirit of Clemson” Award winners.
Fans becoming family
The Grooms family’s fan support has grown from tarmacs and loading docks to becoming extended family of the Tigers’ team.
Paula still keeps in touch with Trevor and Devin Booker and their family. She received a text a few months ago from former Tiger Catalin “Bobo” Baciu, currently playing basketball in Romania, saying he and his wife had their first child, a baby boy. The mothers of Gabe Devoe and Rod Hall also check in from time to time.
Jag, who has a practice jersey from Rod Hall, keeps up with Lyles Davis, exchanging an Instagram message or two here and there.
“I just don’t get into the families like she does,” Jag said of his grandmother.
On top of that, Paula Grooms has been giving the invocation at the team’s annual banquet at the end of the season for around eight years, and she makes an appearance at the Tigers’ preseason get-together.
Though neither Paula nor Jag have a favorite player, they do have players with whom they have closer relationships. Aamir Simms is one of those players for Paula. During his time at Clemson, Paula and Simms, who she nicknamed “Dimples,” built a bond so strong it made Jag, now an adult and pursuing a career in welding, question his position in the grandchild pecking order.
“Well, I thought I was the favorite, but years have gone by and I realize my spot,” he said.
Paula, quick to correct him, replied: “You are. Aamir’s just right under.”
Providing a maternal figure plays the biggest role in why Paula supports Clemson’s men’s basketball team. While some players have families close by, such as Spartanburg native PJ Hall, others come from out of state or even internationally. Grooms wants to make sure each Tiger feels supported and encouraged.
“Coach Brownell once said it’s really good that the Grooms are there when we get home after a loss because I haven’t been very nice to them and they need it,” she said. “You try to boost them up when they are so down and beating themselves up and you say, ‘When you took that shot from the corner’ or ‘When you stole the ball.’ You try to remember something about each player. You try to keep their morale up.”
Grooms said Tigers football head coach Dabo Swinney once asked if she’d consider going out for the football team to which she politely declined. All of her support goes to the Tigers’ men’s basketball team, which she called her life before quickly correcting herself and saying that honor goes to her family.
That didn’t go unnoticed by Jag, who called it to his grandmother’s attention.
“Y’all are my life,” Paula Grooms reassured. “Y’all are my reason for breathing.”
“You said it right the first time,” Jag retorted.
This story was originally published March 6, 2022 at 5:00 AM.
