If ESPN can be more than 2 monts late on this one, so can I. Apparently, it will take more than winning the sport’s most glittering prize for ice hockey to be fully embraced in the Tar Heel State. From the News Observer’s James Nesbitt (dated May 25)

Davis Jones thinks historical figures should be honored, not used to hustle another Stanley Cup run by the Carolina Hurricanes.

Angered by the oversized Canes jerseys stitched in place on four larger-than-life statues at the state Capitol, Jones grabbed a utility knife Wednesday morning and slashed the garments off the monuments for President Andrew Jackson and Gov. Zebulon Vance, the state’s chief executive during the Civil War.

“That’s not the purpose of state monuments, to make them mannequins for a fleeting sports event,” said Jones, 49, a small-business owner, consultant and carpenter from Raleigh. “As a native North Carolinian, I feel it’s very disrespectful and disgraceful to do this.”

But before he could cut away the jerseys on the other two statues — President George Washington and Gov. Charles Aycock — Jones was stopped and issued a citation for “injury to the personal property” of the state of North Carolina, a misdemeanor, said State Capitol Police Chief Scott Hunter.

The custom-made pullovers are property of the Canes and are the same ones that were used to turn the statues of Aycock, Vance, Washington and Ol’ Hickory into Caniacs during the team’s 2002 appearance in the Stanley Cup finals, said Howard Sadel, the team’s marketing and creative services director.

As she did four years ago, Sadel’s wife, Christine, a seamstress, stitched the jerseys in place Tuesday, climbing a short ladder to dress up Jackson’s brawny statue.

“Jackson (above) probably would have been a defenseman in his day,” Howard Sadel said jokingly.

Fair ’nuff. Though had Oleg Tverdovsky roamed the earth in Jackson’s era, I’d like to think he wouldn’t have been a slave owner.