Continue reading »]]> The more this year goes on, the more it feels like ’05.  I may be alone in this, but it has this eerie déjà vu quality.  2005 had the rough loss at Duke, blown last possession.  This year, same thing (except at home).  ’05 had to win a bunch of games down the stretch without a key player, this year same thing.  Ray Felton was indispensable, and so is Kendall.  Sean May went to another level late in the year, and that seems to be happening with Zeller.  And on and on and on.

I say that (again) to say that I hope it translates on Saturday night.  I watch this team play and I see them sleepwalk (mostly) to a 24 point win against a decent Maryland team, and I’m left with a feeling of…..disappointment (?).  I remember watching the Heels beat a defenseless (literally and figuratively) Virginia team led by Pete Gillen in 2005.  That was one of the worst thrashings I’ve ever seen a Tar Heel team deliver to a BCS opponent.  At one point the Heels were up 50.  50!!!….and on the road no less.  I wrote that year that the only thing standing in the way of the Heels was….themselves.  As long as they played the way they were capable (not out of their minds, just play like they can) I believed they were the best team in the country.  And they proved me right.

Amazingly, I feel the same way about this year’s team (despite all the hand-wringing).  I watch UK, and I see Anthony Davis play great but I don’t see him keeping Zeller from scoring.  I see how good Terrance Jones can be, but I also remember how much trouble Henson gives him.  I watch Syracuse and I see a team dismal at rebounding the ball, and I wonder how in the world Fab Melo can stay in the game with Zeller and Henson constantly crashing the glass all around him.  I see Michigan St. ahead of the Heels in the polls, and playing well, and I remember how Carolina played poorly and still smacked Sparty around on the boat.

But they have to prove it on Saturday.  It’s time for them to score, it’s time for them to defend, it’s time for them to get out on the break, it’s time for them to make the other team look bad.  It’s time.

There are some “wishes” I have for how Carolina should play against Duke.  I have no illusions, but I’m hoping some of this comes to pass.

1.  Nobody gets to catch-and-shoot -> This is the easiest thing to implement on short notice.  There are some technical aspects to this, but it primarily involves not using the classic “help” philosophy of old-school defenses.  Not helping means you stay attached to your man, and that keeps catch-and-shoot situations to a minimum.  Curry and Rivers are the only guys that can put the ball on the floor, but they generally like to take one dribble to create space and then launch.  Make them move when dribbling, and then don’t leave to help when they attack (which leaves Dawkins/Kelly/etc. wide open).

2.  Multiple defenses for the ball screen -> This requires Roy to change drastically, so I doubt we’ll see any of it.  The different defenses deal, mainly, with which big guy comes to set the screen.

a.  If it’s not Ryan Kelly (so any Plumlee, or other big guy) then you double the dribbler coming off the screen.  In fact, I’m inclined to “jump” the screen – have Zeller/Henson/JMM ignore Plumlee as he sets the screen and begin the double before Curry/Rivers gets to the screen.  If Curry/Rivers give it up to Plumlee, then the defense wins.  Neither Plumlee is going to do anything with the ball 20 feet from the bucket.  If you force Curry/Rivers to go back towards the time line, the defense wins.  If Curry/Rivers manage to split the double and get in to the paint, the defense wins (mid-range 2 < open 3).

b.  If Kelly is the screener, the guy guarding dribbler must go over the screen and Henson/JMM must hug Kelly.  Give the dribbler one option only – go under the arc.  This should be the default if the dribble defender is unsure of what to do.  When in doubt, go over the screen.

*Notice how the normal hedge is not in play here.  Either you’re doubling, or you’re going over.  No switching, and no hedging.  Duke has a smart coach (news flash), and he’s figured out how to exploit the typical ball screen defenses.  So what you don’t do is play the typical ball screen defense.

3.  Put the ball in Kendall’s hands and spread the floor -> K wants to make Marshall a scorer.  It makes sense to take advantage of this.  Duke doesn’t have a single player – not one – that can guard KM in space.  Kendall has played Duke 4 times, and the only time he didn’t play well was when Nolan Smith really got in to him.  Nolan is gone, and now Duke has no answer for Marshall.  Spread the floor and let Marshall go to work.  Henson and Zeller will have to score off the block a bit, but they should both be able to do that.  Eventually K will give ground and force Kendall to shoot from the perimeter, but that means no one will be in Marshall’s face.  Several teams have tried that lately, and none successfully.  Kendall is like Tom Brady or Eli Manning.  If you don’t get pressure on him he’s going to make you pay.  Let KM wind the clock down and then run a variation of 4C.  Control tempo, limit possessions, and attack Duke where they’re weakest:  perimeter defense.

4.  Make peace with giving up some easy 2’s -> Another one of those things Roy isn’t going to grasp.  A layup by Rivers on a blow by is better than a Rivers 3.  A dunk by a Plumlee is better than a 3 by Dawkins.  Roy just has to understand – 14 uncontested layups are better than 14 made 3’s.

I’m convinced that if Carolina did all 4 things they would beat Duke to death.  If they just do #4 they’ll be close all the way.  And if they do #4 and they make some shots, they’ll win easily.

K is smart.  I think we’ve established that.  He knows UNC completely controlled the second half 3 weeks ago.  He won’t let that happen again.  If Roy just lines up and plays, he loses.  K figured out Roy a long time ago.  When the talent is roughly equal (as it is now), K wins.  It’s that simple.  And sometimes K wins when he doesn’t have equal talent (something Roy hasn’t been able to do).  To beat Duke you have to make them do something they aren’t prepared to do.

Duke wants to shoot the 3.  Take that away – completely – and play ball.  I’d love to see what happens.

Continue reading »]]> My running blog for the game, with comments at the end.

14:01  Too fast for 4 minutes, just right for the last 2.  The Heels cannot run with UK, just stay  in a half court game and all will be good.  Nice to see RB effective early on both ends.  Henson-Jones III is shaping up to be big-time.

11:45  HB’s second foul, not good.  He has to be in the game.  Henson is really in TJ’s head, which is good.  If this becomes TJ trying to out-duel Henson, I like the Heels chances.  Love to see PJ in the game, great sign.

7:24  The UK guys are playing a lot of minutes, Davis especially.  That will help down the stretch.  You can tell the Cats haven’t played a team that matches up with them so well.  Davis is having a problem dealing with a focused Zeller.  Carolina’s offensive efficiency the last 8+ minutes has been outstanding.

3:50  A great example of how little Justin Watts should play, and how important the 3 is.  The Heels are hot from deep, and it’s the difference right now.  And, why in the world would John Henson be on the bench so long…especially with Watts in the game (??).  TJ lit up Watts but good.  That is a complete mismatch.  HB’s 3rd foul – ugh.  That could prove to be big later.

Half  UNC 43, UK 38  The Henson’s missed dunk was a foul, but the Doron Lamb charge was not one – so it evens out.  The Heels are going to get plenty of 3 looks in the second half because UK will never let the lane be available.  Carolina will have to prove it can really shoot from deep for 40 minutes.  If Jones can be contained a bit, the Heels might be able to eek ahead by double-digits.  Look for Anthony Davis to be a lot more involved, and look for Darius Miller to move over to the point if UK continues to struggle in the half court.

14:02  (56-52) Terrific plodding by UNC.  They are having some trouble dealing with the one-on-one stuff, but everywhere else they’re fine.  The long stretch without a blow will help the Heels.  Continuing to hit the 3, so far so good.

8:13  (60-58)  Neither coach is going to call a timeout.  Survival of the fittest.  Amazing the Heels cold go over 5 minutes without scoring and still be in the lead.  Look for a mental error to decide the game late.

7:55  (60-59)  Zeller needs to recognize his day as a scorer is over unless he can get the miss.  UK will not let him catch it and score the rest of the way.

3:28  (64-69)  As always, the 3 is huge.  The Heels not getting them now, and Lamb knocks down back-to-back 3’s.  The ball game is effectively over now as UK has the ball and is in the bonus.  The Heels need to spend the next 3+ minutes making sure they get good shots.  Get Zeller out of the post and let HB go to the hole.  If he can get fouled, that will help.  If not, just kick it out and let Zeller knock down the 12 footer.  As long as Zeller is in the post, UNC will not be able to get to the rim.  Hairston needs to be in the rest of the way as well.

Final  UK 72, UNC 71  John can’t be the shooter at the end of a game (unless it’s a put-back or no other option).  7 seconds left and HB popping clean to Henson’s left (Gilchrist lost HB).  That had HB-game-winner written all over it.  All Henson had to do was give it to Barnes, and that’s the ball game.

I’ll give the Heels credit.  I didn’t think they could stay with Kentucky, much less control the entire first half.  If you told me at noon today that Carolina would lead at the half by 5 and hold UK to 34 points in the second half, I would have said the Heels win by double-digits.  Hard to be overly mad at the effort.

I hate to say it, but I think this really may be Calipari’s title year.  UK is nowhere near as good as they’ll be in 3 months.  I really like Kidd-Gilchrist, and Doron Lamb is a super player.  Not sure the Heels will get a whole lot better.  The lack of a penetrator is going to cause some problems.

I’d like to see Roy understand that Zeller doesn’t have to be in the post on every single possession.  From 8 minutes on, Calipari sent the immediate double at Zeller.  Keeping him in the post did two things:  1) It ensured he wouldn’t score, and he nearly turned it over several times  2) It completely clogged up the lane so there was no chance for any penetration whatsoever.  Essentially, Cal turned UNC in a team of jump shooters.  Carolina will see this over and over again the rest of the season.  If the Heels want to help themselves, Zeller is going to have to spend some time at the high post.  Not every possession, but more than he does now.

I should say, though, that I’m impressed with Roy’s defensive game plan.  If you kept watching CBS after the game (and, why should you), Calipari talked about Carolina giving up the middle (and how UK exploited that).  Notice, however, how Calipari wasn’t saying “They gave us the 3 all day”.  Roy has been studying his math.

Because of that plan, the Heels didn’t get killed from behind the arc.  That allowed them to control the first half despite HB’s foul trouble, and maintain the lead even after they went more than 5 minutes in the second half without a point, and have a chance to win the game at the end.  Carolina made Lamb, Miller, Jones, and even Wiltjer put the ball on the floor.  Sure, they made some nice plays (Jones especially, but that defensive plan allowed Carolina to weather a slew of UK storms and be right there at the end despite shooting sub-40% in the second half while UK shot 56%.  Very little went well for the Heels in the second half (they only scored 28 points), but they kept UK close down the stretch by not giving up a bunch of easy 3’s (Lamb’s 3’s weren’t easy, those were just good shots by him).

If this is the way Carolina plays defense the rest of the way, they’ll be fine.  Kentucky is probably the only team in the country that beats the Heels today given how well UNC shot the 3 and defended the 3.

Continue reading »]]> Rather than do a blow-by-blow of what happened over the weekend, I thought it better to focus on a specific item that will continue to give the Heels trouble unless it’s addressed:  Defending the three point shot.  This really starts with defending the high and side ball screen.  Carolina may look at times like it doesn’t know how it wants to defend the ball screen.  This is because they have various options based on personnel and time-score situations.  Sometimes they go under, sometimes they go over, sometimes the big man hedges, sometimes he doesn’t, and in end-game situations they switch all screens (which is why Zeller ended up guarding UNLV’s point guard late in the game).

There is a reason for all of it.  Against non-shooters, they go under.  Against shooting big guys, they don’t hedge so they can stay close to the big man shooter.  Typically, they do the standard hedge-go-over-recover.  And Roy likes the late game switching because it forces the other team to use more of the clock and tends to get their offense a bit out of sync on a crucial possession (in theory).

To be honest, I’m ok with all the screen defenses.  You can’t guard the screen one way anymore because so many teams run their entire offense off the high and side screen action.  My problem is what happens behind the screen.  The over-helping is really non-help.  I mentioned this in the preview post and I’ve already seen more of it in the first month of the season by two dozen different teams.  Call it dribble-drive, call it drive-and-kick, call it whatever you want.  The reality is that teams have moved completely away from throwing the ball in the post to score.  Set a high screen and give the dribbler a 3-way go:  pitch it to the ball side corner if the help comes (this is what happened to UNC), slip it to the post guy if the big man steps up to hard to help, or reverse the ball to the opposite corner if there is over-rotation on the back side (this happened to UNC too).

UNLV is a contemporary team.  Their entire offense is built around getting a 3 pointer.  The.Whole.Offense.  So it begs the question:  Why would you play an old-style defense against a new-style offense?  When Bellfield (and Anthony Marshall) kept using the high ball screen, Carolina tried to keep him from turning the corner and scoring in the lane.  Why?  Just let him go.  This is a guy that took 12 shots, 8 of them 3’s and took only 1 free throw.  So do the math.  Does he want to turn the corner and drive to the hoop, or does he want to turn the corner and spot up for 3 (and later pitch it to the corners for Stanback)?  Let him turn the corner, let him get in the lane, if he makes a 2 over Henson/Zeller with Kendall hustling to bother him from behind, so be it.

More importantly, if you take away the 3 you take away UNLV’s offense.  It’s no different than what teams tried to do 40 years ago, it’s just inverted.  Back in the day defenses were geared to eliminate the post players.  Now it’s time to adjust.  Force teams to make mid-range shots and it throws their offense out of sync.  If you don’t do that you get the UNLV result.  Roy can get away with it most of the time because he has the better players.  But a couple/three times each year something like this pops up.  And the maddening part is that he (Roy)  finally has the perfect personnel to be good at defending the 3.  Two very large big guys + long, quick wing players = what you want to defend the 3.  Force teams to dribble the ball in the ground, give them no outlets around the arc, make the small ball handlers score over Henson/Zeller.  Pretty easy.  You get residual benefits too.  Since the big guys on the other team are always on the perimeter setting screens you can remove them from the rebounding equation (as opposed to what happens when you defend incorrectly and allow the big guy to roll down the lane and get inside position because you’ve over-rotated on the help).  And, if the other team’s guards are always shooting in the lane, that means they’re always running behind Kendall when the ball comes back up in transition (make or miss).  When the opposition’s guards are always shooting 3’s they have an instant 20-22 foot head start on keeping Marshall in front of them (something Dave Rose game-planed on Sat. with great results as Bellfied and Marshall harassed Kendall all night all over the court).

Bad rebounding and Kendall being harassed by a quicker defender – that leads to poor offense.  And that’s what we got on Saturday.  The unimaginative defense bled over to the offense.  This is what Wisconsin will do on Wed. (and do it far better than UNLV because they are far better defensively), and it will be what UK does on Sat.  Roy will either adjust, or the Heels will look befuddled.  My money is on the latter.  Williams looks at the improved defensive 3 pt. FG% this year and sees better 3 pt. defense.  I see fool’s gold.  Teams practice shooting hundreds and hundreds of 3’s each week.  These teams want to shoot the 3 on EVERY possession.  It is their ENTIRE offense.  Failing to recognize that and stop it is more than just bad coaching.  It’s unintelligent coaching.  Roy is far from unintelligent.  That leads me to believe that he simply can’t change.  He’s blinded by 40 years of coaching philosophy.

I watch Brad Stevens teach and coach defense, and I see imagination.  I watch Tony Bennett teach and coach defense, and I see contemporary philosophy.  I watch Roy teach and coach defense and I see a guy – a math major mind you – that can’t add.  To Roy, an easy 2 is worth more than an easy 3.  Stop the easy 2 and try to bother the easy 3.  If you’re the 2009 team you can win this way because you have an offense that puts a ridiculous amount of pressure on the other team.  That makes those easy 3’s a lot harder when you know Carolina is almost assuredly going to score on the other end.  This year’s team is built differently.  Roy should embrace that.  Embrace the 62-60 games.  Use Henson.  Funnel people to him.  Take away the other team’s preferences (at no point on Sat. did UNLV look uncomfortable on offense).

The Heels have trouble scoring efficiently, despite having the best passing point guard in the program’s history.  What does that tell you?  It tells me that this is a very bad offensive basketball team.  Henson is limited, so is Strickland, and so is Kendall.  Offensively, those guys are limited in their ability to score.  No shame in that, no shame whatsoever.  They have other skills that are off-the-charts good.  UNC has 3 guys that can score:  PJ Hairston, Harrison Barnes, and Tyler Zeller.  Barnes and Zeller have other flaws that limit their effectiveness, which greatly impacts how smoothly Carolina’s offense flows.  All of this adds up to the anti-Roy team.  This is why I wrote that I didn’t think this team could/would win the title.  Not enough offense and a lack of 3 point defense.  UNLV exposed both of those big-time.

Only one thing is left to see:  Will Roy adjust?

Continue reading »]]> I could give some well-thought-out analysis of last night’s 24-21 loss to the Hokies.  But, really, there is no need to do that.  As they have all season (save the Clemson game), UNC showed it has just as much or more talent than every opponent it has played.  At times the Heels have looked good on offense, defense, and special teams.  The problem – and this rose up in every phase last night – is the good stretches are few and far between.

Carolina is exactly the team I thought they would be when I picked them to go 6-6 at the beginning of the year (they now stand at 6-5 with Duke left to go).  Bryn Renner has been good, and he’s been not so good.  The defensive front has been top-notch, but the defensive secondary has been low-notch.  The lack of imagination by the defensive staff – limited by a lack of players and play-makers on the back end – reached its nadir last night.  As they did against Wake (with great success), the Heels blitzed the Hokies early in an effort to break tendency.  Unfortunately, Frank Beamer doesn’t let his quarterback hold the ball very long so blitzing rarely works against the sturdy Virgina Tech offense.  Once Ryan Houston fumbled on the 2 and the Hokies recovered you had a sense that something bad was about to happen.  And it did.  18 plays and 95 yards later Tech tied the game at 7.  Ball game.

Allowing a team to go 95 yards is painful to watch, especially watching the Hokies do it in typical drip-drip-drip fashion.  Carolina bottled up Tech’s running game, and limited Logan Thomas through the air, and still couldn’t really stop the Hokies.  Why?  Because UNC does nothing to bother the other team schematically on defense.  The one theme that has been present all season is Carolina’s inability to make the other team’s offense – and the quarterback specifically – uncomfortable.  The one time they did manage to rattle the opposition’s offense resulted in a massive beat-down of Wake Forest.  This puts incredible pressure on UNC’s offense to perform at a high level on every series.  That has happened some, but not enough.  So, what you get is a marginally competitive team with a 6-5 record against a soft schedule.

But the real talking point today is the status of Everette Withers.  At this point it’s pretty clear to everyone (him included one would think) that Withers has 1 or 2 more games left in his Carolina coaching career.  Because of this, I have a radical idea – can Withers before the bowl.  Staff and all – let ‘em walk.  Yes – this would just about insure a bowl loss, and tremendous chaos and outrage would result.  And it would be very difficult to get a staff organized quickly enough.  But hear me out.

If you could get Gus Malzahn to agree the take the job this weekend (My choice, if he’s interested.  Imagine the spread offense in Chapel Hill.  Very cool.), he could begin organizing some folks to come with him now.  Assistants have left teams before bowl games in the past so they could get started on their new jobs, so it’s not unprecedented.  And, it would give Malzan a full month to begin working with his new players.  The bowl game would become a huge, fun thing.  New offense, new defense, new coach – very cool.  Right now, can you honestly say you’re looking forward to the Emerald Bowl or the Military Bowl?

If you want to make football important, and not just talk about it being important, then make it important right now.  You’re not doing anything unjust to the players.  They know Withers is done (as we saw from Gio Bernard’s comments after the State game).  And, telling Withers now allows him (and the rest of the assistants) a chance to actively start looking for a new job as they come open (presumably next weekend).

Give the new coach a running start.  Let him take the helm next Sunday.  Let him install the new game plan for the bowl game.  Let him run the 15+ practices between Thanksgiving and New Year’s.  Let all those potential recruits see what Carolina football could be by watching the new Heels take the field in the bowl game.  And, most importantly, let the new coach get a head start on recruiting (as Butch Davis had when he was hired).

Hire the guy now.  Like, right now.

Continue reading »]]> Imagine that your job required you to fly to the west coast for two days to give a once-in-a-lifetime presentation.  Then imagine that just before you are to give this presentation, the President of the United States shows up to talk to you and to watch you give your presentation.  Then imagine that you had to leave immediately after giving your presentation and take a red-eye back east.  You get to rest one day, and then you have to give a sales pitch to people who you know are going to hate it even before you begin the pitch.  Amazingly, though, both the presentation and the sales pitch go over as well as you could have ever hoped.

Folks, UNC’s basketball season has begun about as well as any of us could have hoped.  I think Roy Williams likes doing this to the teams he thinks can be very good.  By “this” I mean he likes to challenge them in a very difficult way.  It’s hard to remember a time the Heels opened the season with two games any more difficult than these two.  Both the Spartans and the Bulldogs are near-lock NCAA tournament teams, and both games were played in less than ideal spots (speaking only about basketball here – clearly what happened on the U.S.S Carl Vinson is an incredibly ideal life experience).  Despite all the hoopla, all the travel, all the difficulty, Carolina managed to put both games away early in the second half.  In fact, despite everything, UNC led by 20 in both games.  Later in the year as we monitor how well Michigan State and UNC-Asheville do, we’ll all look back and marvel at that.

So, Roy gets his wish.  His Heels were most definitely challenged in both games.  In sort of an odd reversed NCAA opening weekend format (UNC-A would be a normal opening round opponent, and MSU would be a normal second round foe), Williams got to see – and see right away – just how his team would fare in a tournament-type routine.  Both games went about as I expected.  I thought UNC would struggle for a while with the Spartans but find a way to ease ahead late in the second half.  The Heels actually exceeded this a bit by easing ahead late in the first half and jumping all over Tom Izzo’s crew early in the second half.  Carolina did let MSU hang around, but the game was never in doubt in the second half.

The UNC-A game was close throughout the first half.  Kendall Marshall smartly managed the last 50 seconds of the half to get the Heels the last four points before intermission.  That popped a tenuous 5 point lead up to 9, and allowed UNC to continue that popping for ten minutes of the second half.  Amazingly, in neither of the two games did Carolina ever lead by less than double digits in the second half (you can nit-pick this a bit with the first few moments of the second half against UNC-A, but you get where I’m going here).

Really, neither of these two games had much to do with basketball.  This was a toughness test.  And it was immediate.  Like, right now – you have to be tough.  Right.Now.  And UNC was tough.  Very, very tough.  Clearly they didn’t play their best basketball in either game.  But, goodness, it’s so early in November.  This is as early as I can ever remember the season starting in earnest.  Not even four full weeks of practice have elapsed, yet Carolina has played a good Michigan St. team on a boat, and played a true road game against a probable conference champ.

I liked what I saw from Kendall Marshall, John Henson, Harrison Barnes, and P.J. Hairston.  I really liked what I saw of Dexter Strickland in his backup point guard role (not so thrilled with him shooting outside the lane though).  I’d like to see more from Reggie Bullock and James Michael McAdoo.  I think Tyler Zeller is still adjusting to being the number one option, and Roy treating him that way.  And I’m scratching my head as to why Justin Watts is the first “big” man off the bench (or why he gets any minutes at all, save the end of the game mop-up).

Two home games upcoming which should be fairly simple victories, then off to Las Vegas for a couple of games which shouldn’t be much harder.  After this, the real games begin.  First up are the 13th ranked Wisconsin Badgers led by first team All-America point guard Jordan Taylor, and then a trip to Lexington on Dec. 3 to take on the mighty Kentucky Wildcats in Rupp Arena.  We’ll know a lot more about the Heels after this stretch of games.

For now, I’m excited to see the toughness from last year’s post-Larry Drew team has carried over in to this season.

Continue reading »]]> Last week I gave credit.  This week I will not be doing that.

If you hold a team to 13 points, and only 3 in the second half, you have to win the game.  Have.To.

Coming off nearly 600 yards of total offense against Wake Forest, the Heels manage only a third of that total today and score exactly no points.  Embarrassing doesn’t begin to describe the pathetic production of UNC’s offense.  This was John Schoop’s worst day in five season’s as offensive coordinator.  Defensively, Carolina was pretty decent.  The front four was especially good almost all day long.  More importantly, for the first time maybe all year, the defense was good enough keep the Heels offense in the game until the very end.

But this game was more about caring and preparation.  What infuriates State fans about North Carolina is the fact that Tar Heel fans don’t really care about the State games (despite what Everett Withers said this week).  Simply put, State just cares more.  And that shows in the 0-5 record the Heels have since John Bunting was fired.  What infuriates Carolina fans is the fact that the Wolfpack has a staff full of competent football coaches.  Tom O’Brien, Dana Bible, Mike Archer, John Tenuta.  Those are serious football guys.

Right now, UNC does not have the same level of serious football guys inhabiting Kenan Stadium.  Maybe that will change in a couple of months.  But this fact should give all Tar Heel fans pause:  Since Bill Dooley left Chapel Hill in the fall of 1977, UNC has had only one good football coach (Mack Brown).  Dick Crum, Carl Torbush, John Bunting, Butch Davis, Everette Withers.  Those five have had some decent moments (Crum’s 1980 ACC title season being the best).  But none were good, and a couple of them were down-right awful.  34 years with one decent coach is not going to work.  The longer this goes on, the more Duke-like Carolina football becomes.

One day we’ll all wake up and realize what is becoming more obvious by the day.  North Carolina football is one step above bad…but only on some days.  Mostly it’s just bad.

Continue reading »]]> For all the discredit I’ve handed out to Everett Withers, I will not do that today.  Withers deserves an immense amount of credit for a huge bounce-back 49-24 win over Wake Forest.  A trampled defense turned up the heat on Wake QB Tanner Price right from the first possession, and managed to hold the ACC’s leading receiver Chris Givens to one-third of his average game total.  The secondary had a couple of lapses, but only a couple.  Offensively, Bryn Renner was spectacular.  In fact, it was a career day for the whole offense as the Heels put up 560 yards on the Deacs.  Renner set a career high with 338 yards, Gio Bernard came within a yard of rushing for a career high (154 yards), and while Dwight Jones didn’t get in the end zone he did set career high in receiving yards.

I’m sure this was a tough week in Chapel Hill on a number of fronts this weeks.  However, Withers and his staff calmly met the players last Sunday after a soul crushing loss to Clemson.  The positive approach appears to have worked.  This was the most prepared, on both sides of the ball, the Heels have been all season.  It was nice to see some early pressure on Tanner Price.  The early blitz, sack, and fumble recovery by Zach Brown would stay with Price all afternoon until Jim Grobe pulled his QB late in the game.  And with the offense putting up the most points a Carolina team has registered in seven years, Price would have had to be sharp as a knife today.  He wasn’t, and the Heels rolled.

The only knit-picking I’ll do is on John Schoop.  It’s time to find, and use, some packages for A.J. Blue.  Blue can throw it and he’s proven to be a pretty powerful and fairly fast runner.  It would be nice to see a couple of new wrinkles featuring Blue next week in Raleigh.  Ah…yes…Raleigh.  NC State week.  Lovely.  The Pack is coming off a beat-down worse than what the Heels suffered last week in Death Valley.  34-oh down in Tallahassee.  So, as usual, Carolina finds itself in an odd game with State.  It sure would be nice to see blue beat red for a change.

Continue reading »]]> Every year I go to the UNC basketball coach’s clinic and watch a couple of practices, and every year I come to the clinic with tons of questions about the Tar Heels.  Questions such as:  Will Kendall Marshall be able to play 30+ effective minutes each game?  Will Harrison Barnes be as great (more great?) as he was the second half of last year?  Is Tyler Zeller going to be able to play an entire season the way he did in the NCAA tournament last year?  Is Reggie Bullock really healthy?  Who will be the leader of the Jump Around dance now that Leslie McDonald is hurt?

All of these questions are important.  But, really, there is only one question that any of us care about:  Is this team capable of winning a national championship?  We’ll get to that in a bit.

Since the media has been trying to compare this year’s team to the 2005 and 2009 title winners, I’ll take the bait and spend a few lines doing that too.  In his media day press conference last week, Roy Williams admitted there were some similarities between his two championship teams and this year’s squad.  I don’t really see it with the 2009 team, but I understand what Roy is trying to do.  It’s a good coaching move, one designed to let his players know that he really does think this team can win in April.

The core group that made up the 2008-09 team won A WHOLE LOT of games prior to the ’08-’09 season.  That group had won two ACC regular season titles, two ACC tournament titles, been to a Final Four, and come within a Wayne Ellington jumper of going to the Final Four two years earlier as well.  They accomplished all of this before they set foot on the court in 2008.

This year’s team has one ACC regular season title.  That’s it.

But this year does look a bit similar to 2004-05. (Disclaimer:  I wrote what comes next prior to the Grantland.com article that picked the Heels to win it all this year.  This section looks very similar to what’s in that article….but mine came first, even though I always wait until after the coach’s clinic to send out this email.  Just didn’t want you people to think I’m a plagiarist.  <Insert Michael McAdoo joke here>).

In 2005, if Raymond Felton wasn’t on the court the Heels were in trouble.  This year, if Kendall Marshall isn’t on the court, the Heels are in trouble.  In 2005, the best reserve was a freshman big man with uncommon ability (Marvin Williams).  This year, arguably the best reserve could be a freshman big man with uncommon ability (James Michael McAdoo).  In 2005, UNC had a nearly unstoppable post presence (Sean May).  This year, UNC may have a nearly unstoppable post presence (Tyler Zeller).  In 2005, the Heels had a scoring machine on the wing that few teams could handle (Rashad McCants).  This year, the Heels have a scoring machine on the wing that few teams will be able to handle (Harrison Barnes).  And then there is this:  The 2005 team entered that season having lost close to 50 games over the previous three seasons (47 to be exact).  The fact that Roy was able to overcome such a losing mentality and win his first title is remarkable (and remains an underrated achievement for Williams).  While this year’s team hasn’t lost nearly as much as the ’05 team had, there is still a group of players who suffered through the Larry Drew Era.  That era was marked by poor play, lots of losses, and incredibly bad chemistry.  It appears the chemistry issues have been fixed, and tons of wins have followed Drew’s exit.

In 2005, Carolina built on the previous season’s success and put together a great late season run to win the title.  Can this year’s team build on last year’s success and put together a great late season run….and win a title?

If you’re looking for a word to describe what I saw over the two days it would be:  Surprising.

I expected to see the kind of practices I’ve been used to during Roy’s tenure.  This would include lots of work on the secondary break, lots of offensive work, and a decent effort in the various defensive drills.  What I saw, though, was by far the most effort I’ve seen during defensive drills in Roy’s nine preseasons at Carolina.  The players showed incredible attention to detail in all the drills, but especially during the defensive work.  It seemed clear that this year’s team knows exactly how they’ll get themselves to Monday night in April – by playing lock-down defense.  I was very surprised to see this, but I’ll take this kind of surprise from the Heels every year.

I’ll dive in to some specifics in a second, but here are a few overall thoughts:

– Tyler Zeller looked awesome.  He is in truly sick shape.  He runs and runs and runs…and runs.  And he does it on every single possession, and at surreal speed for a guy that’s over seven feet tall.  It’s impossible to convey just how astonishing it is to see Zeller fly all over the place at his size.  More astonishing is the fact that the big fella never looks winded.  He and Dexter Strickland are in the best shape of anyone on the team, and it’s not close.  The other cool thing about Zeller is that he never misses in the paint.  His offensive arsenal is wide and varied.  Simply put, he cannot be covered by one guy.  He’s too big, he’s too good with either hand, and now he’s more than happy to absorb contact on his way to the hole (details about this to follow).

– PJ Hairston can really shoot the ball.  This guy…oh boy, he’s a player.  He has NBA written all over him.  Big body, big hops, smooth stroke, he’s got it all.  He needs to get a bit more comfortable in the offense, and get in a little bit better shape, but both of those will come.

– Harrison Barnes is becoming a defensive force.  He guarded a variety of players – big and small – during the two days.  He shut them all down.  Essentially, if Barnes is on you then you don’t score and you rarely get the ball.  I felt bad for the walk-ons that were matched up with Barnes.  Those poor guys were harassed all over the court by the Black Falcon.

– Reggie Bullock is back.  His knee is fine, and he looked like the guy we all thought he could be.  He attacks the glass on offense and he’s a ball-hawk on defense.  His shot is still not as consistent as he would like, but it’s almost there.  He was filling it up on Saturday.

So let’s get in to what Roy’s trying to do this year.  In a nutshell, he’s looking to simplify things and become more efficient.  The Heels will use only 8 secondary options this year (half of the 16 in the playbook).  The idea is to execute these 8 options as well as possible.  And, having fewer secondary options will allow Carolina to get back to using the secondary break as a true scoring play as opposed to using it as a way to enter the half-court offense.  Over the last few years, secondary has not been as effective as Roy would like.  The emphasis this season is to get solid production out of the various secondary sets.

If you want to get production out of secondary that means there are going to be a good many possessions in which a shot is taken quickly.  Ok, no problem there.  Roy likes a fast pace.  Use secondary to create a fast pace.  I’m with you so far.  But Roy lost me a little when he said he wants to take every shot in 20 seconds or less.  This is the first time I’ve ever heard him put a stated time on how quickly he wants to shoot the ball.  Usually, he talks about going “as fast as we can”, but has never said “I want to shoot in <x> seconds”.  I was stunned when I heard this.  Paul Hewitt (former Georgia Tech head coach) was often quoted saying that the first 15 seconds of the shot clock belonged to the players, the last 20 belonged to him.  I thought of that when I heard Roy talk about shooting within 20 seconds.  My next thought was:  Hey, didn’t Paul Hewitt get fired?

While I’m not worried about Roy getting fired, I am worried about the Heels hunting shots within the first few seconds of the shot clock.  Having said that, I do like the idea of accentuating the secondary break.  As Roy mentioned, too often the last few years secondary has been used simply to reverse the ball instead of being used as a scoring weapon.  This team has a very high IQ.  I’m not thrilled with the new “shoot it in 20” deal, but I trust this group of players to understand what a good shot is.

When not trying to push the ball in the primary or secondary breaks the offensive emphasis is pretty clear:  Get the ball to Zeller.  For those of us who have waited for Zeller to play at high level, I think the wait ended in March last season.  It appears that has carried over nicely in to this season.  I watched him work on his individual moves in pre-practice both days.  He was a machine.  He made close to 50 shots on a variety of moves and missed barely a handful.  But the most beautiful thing was to see this translated in to live game action.  During the scrimmage sections of each practice Zeller would work his way to the block, get the ball, and score.  Like a machine.  Get the ball, shoot a jump hook, score.  Get the ball, shoot a jump hook, score.  Get the ball, shoot a jump hook…score.  Ok, ok,…you’re sitting there saying “Hey, been there, seen that, not impressed”.  If I’m you, I’m probably saying the same thing.  But Zeller did do something I’m not sure any of us have seen before.  At the very end of Friday’s practice, during a full court drill, Roy made it interesting.  There was to be one more possession, with the starters getting the ball.  The loser of the possession would have to run.  The possession starts, and as you would expect the ball eventually finds its way to Zeller on the right block.  Desmond Hubert (6’9 freshman) was caught behind him.  With the weak-side help rotating over to force Zeller out of the middle, big Tyler wasted no time.  He caught the entry pass and immediately wheeled left – in to the lane and in to the teeth of the help – and with one dribble he rose up on two defenders and threw down the most ferocious two handed slam of his career.  A couple hundred coaches in the stands all went “Ohhhhh!”, as did his fellow starters who were grateful for not having to run.  Zeller’s play was a take-your-breath away moment.  The best way to describe it is to say it was Hansbrough-esque.  He just carried two guys with him to the goal.  The finish was Wallace-esque (as in Rasheed Wallace, the dunking-est big man in Carolina history).  If Zeller plays all season like he played this weekend, he’ll be an All-American.

The rest of the offense works as you might expect as well.  Kendall Marshall orchestrating things, and Harrison Barnes making plays only he can make.  The thing that struck me was how smooth everything looked.  The last two preseasons Larry Drew has been on the floor a lot, which means the last two preseasons have been heavy on turnovers.  Not so this year.  With Marshall conducting the offense, everything just ….works.  Plays are run as they’re supposed to be run, the ball is delivered where it’s supposed to be delivered, and shots come from players and places shots should come from.  There are still screw-ups, but those are only occasional (unlike the consistent nature of breakdowns during the Drew Era).  Along with Zeller’s new-found tenaciousness and the intense defensive effort, another surprising occurrence was the drill work being used to create open 3 pointers.  A good bit of time was spent both days (mainly in the perimeter-only segments when the perimeter guys work together without the post guys) focusing on how to find open 3 looks.  This is smart coaching.  Zeller is going to command double-teams.  Creating an offense that can quickly exploit open shooters is a good move.

Defensively, this is the best Tar Heel team I’ve seen since 1993.  Yes, they really are that good.  This is a championship level defense.  Individually, every position is big and every position but point guard is fast.  Big and fast, and experienced.  Hard to deal with this bunch if you’re an opposing offense.  Most point guards are about 6’1 or 6’2.  Kendall Marshall is 6’4.  Most two-guards are 6’2-6’4.  Dexter Strickland is 6’3 and is ultra-fast (no more knee problems).  Most small forwards are 6’4-6’6.  Harrison Barnes is a big 6’8.  Most power forwards are 6’7-6’9.  John Henson is, well, John Henson.  Nothing like him anywhere in college.  Most centers are roughly 6’9-’6’10.  Tyler Zeller is all over 7’1, and he’s easily the fastest big guy in the country.  This group is smart, quick, long armed, and most importantly they have a terrific understanding of how to play team defense.  Roy referenced how poorly they defended the 3 pointer last year (to the utter dismay of all of us).  The Heels were next to last in 3 point defense in the ACC last season.  So Roy is spending some time getting the entire team to do a better job defending the 3.  This is more good coaching – it’s good recognition of a bad flaw.  Time to take Henson and Zeller’s shot blocking for a test drive.  When you have two guys, Henson especially, that can defend the goal you need to make sure you force teams to your strength.  It seems fairly intuitive – Henson blocks a lot of shots so make teams shoot over Henson.  But Carolina rarely did that last year, as evidenced by the woeful 3 point defense.  This season we should see better 3 point containment with an emphasis on using Henson (and to a lesser extent Zeller) as a true defensive weapon.  A key point of emphasis, one that I was really glad to see, was Roy making a point of telling the perimeter guys not to run through passing lanes when trying to make a steal.  This has always driven me crazy – watching guys miss a steal attempt and then go sailing by as their man is left wide open to drive, shoot a 3, eat sandwich, or read a book.  Roy still wants those open court turnovers, but stolen passes are usually the result of solid ball pressure, not some outstanding over-play.  Make the passer throw a poor pass and guess what….you get a steal.  But you can’t put pressure on the passer if you’re out of position, and Roy certainly knows this.  The idea this year is to contain ball-handlers and shooters while being aggressive…but not over-aggressive.

The one chink in this is really a testament to how to good this bunch is defensively.  Because they all have fantastic defensive instincts, and play hard on that end, they slide in to the over-aggressive tendency a bit too much.  Better said, they over-help too often.  Against today’s college basketball teams – almost all of them 3 point happy – over-helping will get you killed.  Duke has made a living exploiting over-help the last decade.  You get out of position against Duke and somebody is knocking down a 3 on you.  Roy is still teaching lots of help from both the ball and weak sides, which does concern me.  We’ll have to see if his words about being better against the 3 match up with what the players do on the court.  My sense is that the players understand how they can be beaten, and it’s not by allowing teams to shoot over John Henson.  The only way teams will be able have consistent success against Carolina will be if they can shoot (and make) the 3.  Stop that, and the opposition is going to struggle.

The effort the starters showed on defense has bled over to the rest of the team.  Early in Friday’s practice, PJ Hairston took a charge, Stillman White stole a pass, and James McAdoo dove on the ball to save it from going out of bounds.  That’s 3 freshmen – two of them McDonald’s All-Americans – showing tremendous effort on defense.  I know I’m harping on this, but it really is amazing.  I never saw Ty Lawson, or Danny Green, or Wayne Ellington, or Rashad McCants, or Sean May, play with this kind of intensity on defense.  I still remember the joke Roy told in 2004’s preseason when May took a charge.  He looked up at us and said “Folks, that’s the first charge in Sean May’s career”.  I saw Hairston, Barnes, Zeller, and Reggie Bullock take a charge this weekend.  It’s Bizarro Carolina.  A residual benefit of all of this defense is that it’s bound to make the Heels better on offense.  Practicing against this defense every day should make the games seem easy.

Having dealt with philosophy, offense, and defense, let’s move on to the freshmen:

- The guy who stands out the most right now is PJ Hairston.  He has trouble on defense, but he’ll get better.  His skills are there, he just needs to play more.  Offensively, he really does have the whole package.  He can shoot from deep, he can shoot from mid-range, he can put it on the floor, and he can score with contact.  He has fantastic hops too.  Once he gets more comfortable in the offense, watch out.  For now, he’ll do fine.  He just needs to come in and knock down a few shots and not turn it over.  That should not be a problem.

- James McAdoo is going be good, but like most UNC freshmen he’s moving in slow motion right now.  He was noticeably non-existent over two days – which was a “surprise” I didn’t expect.  Right now I get the feeling he’s trying to get his bearings.  I’d love to tell you that he’d looked great, but he didn’t.  He wasn’t bad, but he wasn’t good either.

- On the flip side, I was pleasantly surprised by Desmond Hubert.  Hubert is raw, but athletic.  His ball skills are much better than I expected.  He can handle it without fumbling around, and made some nice jump hooks over the two days.  His form looks good when he faces up, but I’m not sure he’s completely confident in shooting a 10-15 footer yet.  That’s just as well.  I think Roy might kill him if he actually took a jump shot in a game.  I doubt he plays very much, but he won’t be horrible when he does get in.  In a couple of years, he should be pretty good.

- Jackson Simmons is 6’7, and he’s a worker.  He plays hard, and very smart.  He’s not overly fast, but he can play fast because he has so much savvy.  He processes the action quickly enough to overcome a lack of quickness.  He’s got a nice stroke from 15 feet and in, and he understands how to play.  His body type and playing style remind me of Fred Roberts (played at BYU, and then with the Celtics and others in the NBA).  If Simmons is half as productive as Roberts we’ll all be thrilled.

- Stillman White is the last of the freshmen (6’0 point guard from Wilmington), and he can play.  White is another of the “surprises”.  His basketball IQ is way up there.  Amazingly, he already has all the secondary sets down.  He got an “atta boy” from Roy during one secondary drill when he correctly ran one of the new options perfectly.  This is rare praise from Roy to give to a freshman point guard.  Roy is grooming Dexter Strickland to be THE backup to Kendall this year (so much so, that Dexter played with the second string the entire practice on Friday just so he could play point guard exclusively).  However, White should be fine if he has to play 3-6 minutes a game.  He can shoot (better than Marshall), and he’s quick-quick.  He flies all over the place with solid straight line speed.  I thought he would look small and weak, but he’s a player.  He’s likely to be in at the end of a lot of games in December, and it may be the first time in a while where the third string guys are actually able to run good offense.  I’ll even go as far as to say that some 90 point games are going to end up 100 point games because of White.  He’ll be leaving for his Mormon mission after this season.  I hope he comes back when he’s done.  I like this guy a lot.

Here are the rest of the player break-downs:

- Kendall Marshall – Dude has bulked up.  He’s put on some weight without losing a step, which is important.  He’s not going to out-run anybody, but that’s not part of his game anyway.  What he has done is eliminate the weakness that did him in last season.  Nolan Smith completely exposed him in the ACC tournament final.  Smith pushed him around and dared him to go by him to score.  Marshall couldn’t do it, and in the process the Heels’ offense broke down.  This year look for Kendall to put people on his hip and carry them to the bucket.  He’s clearly not bothered by physical play, and he’s tough to deal with in the lane because he’s so big and because he can always find Henson or Zeller to pitch it to.  He looks like a much more confident shooter, and he’s worked to tighten up his stroke.  Marshall is the man.  We all know it, and he does too.  His job is to keep all the parts moving in the right direction.  Given that he looks like he was born to be a Carolina point guard, I think he’ll be fine (note the understatement there).  Defensively, he’s better at keeping the ball in front of him, but he still struggles at times.  He makes a ton of plays because of his size and savvy, but he’ll need to continue to work on not getting beat off the top.

- Dexter Strickland – He can really move, but he still can’t shoot a lick.  Roy even talked to us about it.  The coaches have tried to fix his shot, but he’s having none of it.  Strickland brings the ball directly on top of his head and moves it over to the left when he shoots.  It’s just awful.  Yet, he still thinks he can make shots.  I got news for you Dex, you’re dreaming.  But Strickland’s value has nothing to do with him making shots.  He’s magnificent on defense, and he can sail down the court.  And now he’s actually pretty darn good at being a point guard.  He knows the offense, and it shows in how he plays.  He can be that Jackie Manuel-Marcus Ginyard type, but he really does need to understand that he can’t shoot.  As long as he’s not chucking it up from deep, he’ll be great.

-  Harrison Barnes – Not bad, not bad at all.  I’ll start with the weakness though.  His handle is still a work in progress.  He’s fine in the open court, and he’s awesome when he makes a decisive move to the goal.  It’s everything in between that can be problematic.  He gets himself in to trouble when he’s 20 feet from the basket and tries to make a move that requires more than two dribbles.  As long as he lets Kendall and Dexter handle the dribbling, he’ll be a monster.  He’s very much like Hansbrough in that he is able to manufacture points.  Somehow, when he shoots the ball goes in – almost no matter how he shoots.  During the practices, Barnes scored on tip-ins, he scored on floaters in the lane, he scored on aggressive drives, he scored every way possible.  At his size and strength he’s a matchup nightmare.  Oh, and he’s the best shooter – both in form and in productivity – on the team.  As Roy says, the guy was just born to score.  The big “surprise” with Barnes, though, is in his defense.  He was just killing people in practice.  He’s matching his immense skill set with immense effort, and both of those are now paired with immense defensive intelligence.  As good as he is on offense, he may be better defensively.  Scary thought.

- John Henson – I feel bad for the post guys in practice.  Henson is blocking shots all over the place, and hardly trying while doing it.  The thing I liked most, though, is that Henson is no push-over anymore.  He’s stronger, and he’s wiser.  He knows when to be physical, and when not to.  And now he has the advantage of people being afraid of him.  On offense, this is the most comfortable I’ve seen him.  He’s come a long, long way.  His shot is solid, and he’s worked on being an efficient shooter from 10 feet on either baseline.  He’ll never be mistaken as a “shooter”, but he’ll make some shots this year.  And he’ll look like he knows what he’s doing while he makes them.

- Tyler Zeller – He looks ready to take a huge leap.  I pray he stays healthy, because he could have an incredible season.  He needs to work on making quick decisions with the ball, but he’s not bad now.  He’s better at guarding his man deep in the post, and he’s as smart as they come.  This is what seniors are supposed to look like at UNC.

- Reggie Bullock – Loved how good he looked.  And do the Heels ever need him to have a solid season.  He’s still not in the best shape, but he’s getting there.  He’s another one, on a team full of them, that really understands how to play.  He has some subtleties that are neat to watch.  He hits the offensive glass hard (rare in this age for perimeter players), and he is a very good screener.  I sure hope he finds his shot early in the season.  If he does, he could have a big year.

- Justin Watts – Solid, understands his role, plays hard.  Can’t ask for much more.  His skill set is limited though.  He can make the occasional shot, but he’s not big enough or quick enough to play extended minutes at this level.  You put him with the third string at the end of games and he could be unstoppable.

The starters are pretty well set with Marshall, Strickland, Barnes, Henson, and Zeller.  Hairston will back up Strickland at the 2, Bullock will spell Barnes at the 3.  McAdoo will be the first big guy off the bench for Henson or Zeller, and those three will get almost all of the post minutes.  Hubert, Simmons, White, and Watts will all play in spots for a few minutes.  It’s a deep, experienced, smart, talented team.  On paper, they should be great.  But there is a specific problem.  Offensively, they aren’t great.  They’re good, but not great.  Yes, Zeller is big-time.  Yes, Barnes is superb.  Yes, Marshall is the best pure point guard in the country.  But Henson and Strickland can be liabilities at times.  Because of that, and because Marshall isn’t going to blow by many people, the Heels can be guarded.

They know it, and I believe that’s why they take so much pride in their defense.  This team is not going to win games if they don’t’ show up on defense (unlike 2005 and 2009).  The concern about the offense is also a reason why Roy wants to emphasize using the secondary break as a real scoring threat, and it’s a reason why he wants to shoot more quickly.  Roy talked to us about wanting to create more possessions, and shooting more quickly will surely do that.  But creating more possessions does you no good if you can’t score, and even less good if you can’t stop the other team from scoring.  Roy is taking a smart, calculated risk.  He’s banking on his defense being so good, and Kendall turning it over so little, that they can take some quick shots without fear of it costing them.

Because of the potential for offensive inconsistency, which will put more pressure to be excellent defensively, Roy is doing a couple of other things that I believe are very smart.  During practice he’s not allowing the starters to sub themselves out very much.  He talked about wanting to really work them so that they’re in fantastic shape.  I think this is also a nod towards reality.  The guys coming off the bench simply have no experience.  Justin Watts does, but the players who will be on the court the most are all freshmen (and Bullock might as well be).  Roy knows that if Marshall can’t play more than 30 minutes a night, the Heels will struggle.  The same is true for Henson, Zeller, and Barnes.  Another nod towards reality – spending extra time on late game drills that focus on time and score.  This has long been part of Carolina’s practice structure, but Roy is emphasizing it more this year.  Why?  Because he knows that this probably isn’t an explosive offensive team.  When you can’t score consistently, you have to manage time/score situations better.  To this end, Roy is using his beloved “stop-score-stop” drill to get the players to understand how to win the game with 4-6 minutes left.  Roy used the example of being up 8 with 4 minutes to go.  If the Heels get a stop, come down and score, then get another stop, a minute or more will have run off the clock and Carolina will be up 10 with under 3 to go.  Game over.  Contrast this with giving up a bucket, failing to score, then giving up another bucket and you’re looking at potentially a one possession game with 3 to go.  That’s a huge, huge difference.  Understanding this, working on it (at some length both days), and developing those end-game habits should pay huge dividends later in the year.

Let’s revisit the big question:  Can this team win a national title?  Here’s a stat to ponder that should help provide an answer:  UNC has won six recognized national championships.  In none of those seasons did they lose more than four games.  And in none of those seasons did those teams have a true losing streak (the 2009 team lost its first two ACC games, but that’s as close as it gets).  We’ll know if we have a title team on our hands if we get to February with only 2-3 losses.  It’ll be tough.  November and December are filled with tough games.  And this bunch is still a bit new to all this winning.  My gut says a national title may be just out of reach, but a Final Four is there for the taking.  But, if the Heels leave December undefeated, it could get fun.  I believe this may be one of the most intelligent Carolina basketball teams we’ve seen in a long time.  Marshall, Bullock, Zeller – those are throw back guys, guys that Dean would be proud of.  The ACC tournament comebacks last season definitely reminded us of vintage Tar Heel teams.

I like this team.  It’s clear they like each other.  And their coach really likes them too.  If everyone stays healthy, this should be an exciting year.  I would expect to see a more confident team take the floor this year than left the floor after the Kentucky loss in March.  Roy was hard on them in practice, but they all took the criticism – pointed at times – constructively.  More importantly, the players aren’t approaching practice as chore to get through until the games start.  There is real, focused effort on trying to improve.  It seems obvious to just about everyone that this team will not be together next year.  C.B. McGrath alluded to that during his talk to us.  The players and coaches all seem to have a sense of “the time is now” running through their comments and their actions on the court.

So, yes, I would be “surprised” if this wasn’t a fun year to be a Tar Heel fan.  National title fun?  Maybe.  To win a title, Zeller and Barnes will have to continue to be large weapons on offense.  But you already knew that.  The real key is perimeter defense.  This group should come very close to leading the country in rebounding margin.  This means that even though the offense will struggle in spots, there should be a good number of offensive rebounds to mitigate the lack of initial production.  And it also means that the Heels probably aren’t going to allow too many defensive rebounds to slip away.  That leaves only one sure-fire way to lose – allow the other team to make a bunch of perimeter shots.  We already know teams won’t be able to score in the paint.  They couldn’t do it last year, and it’ll be even more difficult to do this year.  If Marshall, Strickland, Barnes, Bullock, and Hairston can limit the other team’s perimeter offense then UNC can win as many games as it wants to.  Think about the post-Drew losses last year (after Marshall replaced Drew in the starting lineup):  Duke (twice) and Kentucky.  Those games were lost because of Carolina’s inability to contain the good perimeter players of the opposition (namely, Nolan Smith and Brandon Knight).  That’s all that stands in between the Heels being a really good team….or being a great team.

Continue reading »]]> Not much to say, and none of it good.  At some point, North Carolina’s defensive backs are going to have to cover somebody.  If they don’t, we’ve seen the Heels win all the games they’re going to win this year.

59-24 before Dabo Swinney called off the Tigers in the 4th quarter.  59 points in three quarters.  The worst defensive efforts of the John Bunting era weren’t this bad.  If not for T.J. Thorpe’s kickoff return for a touchdown and Clemson completely shutting it down the last fifteen minutes, the score could have been more like 70-20 instead of the not-as-close-as-it-looks 59-38 final.

Unless UNC wins out, Everett Withers saw his chance to become the permanent head coach disappear today.  Probably just as well.  Right now, this staff is doing an extremely poor job of preparing the Heels to play.  That isn’t going to get better with this group of coaches this season.

Let the coaching rumors begin.

Continue reading »]]> When you don’t have a good game plan, you fumble a kickoff, you kick the ball out of bounds on a critical late kickoff, and you don’t convert on two late fourth down attempts, a loss is usually the result.  This game was lost in the first quarter.  Miami’s speed was on display throughout the game, but never more so than in the first fifteen minutes of the game.  It was all Carolina could do to hang on.

Defensively, it was yet another poor effort from a Tar Heel defense that is slowly crumbling before our eyes.  As has been the case all season, UNC’s inability to cover cost the Heels repeatedly.  Yet, incredibly, Carolina held the Canes to 3 points and just over 60 yards in the second half.  Most of that was Miami’s willingness to play conservatively with a large lead, but the Heels defense deserves a ton of credit for not letting the game get away.

Offensively, two words:  Gio Bernard.  He was fantastic.  Nearly 200 yards of total offense for the redshirt freshman (110 yards on the ground, another 78 receiving).  Bernard has become the best all-around back in the ACC.  Conversely, the offensive line has become the anti-Gio.  How so many big, huge guys are unable to protect Bryn Renner is a continuing mystery.  Renner had a big day despite being under constant pressure.  There are some things that bug me about Renner, but toughness is not one of them.  However, if the offensive line doesn’t get their act together Renner may not survive the rest of the year.

At some point, very soon I hope, Withers is going to have to put early pressure on the opposing quarterback.  As we have seen in nearly every game this season, allowing the other team’s quarterback to feel comfortable in the pocket early in the game has proven to be a problem.  Jacory Harris can be rattled.  We’ve all seen it with Harris.  But he can be deadly effective when given a chance to gain confidence, and that’s what we saw today.  Next week Carolina will play the best QB they’ve seen so far this year.  If Clemson’s Taj Boyd is allowed to sit in the pocket and figure things out, Clemson will put up 50 on the Heels in Death Valley.

5-3 with four games left:  vs. Wake, at Virginia Tech, at State, and Duke at home to close it out.  Go 2-2 against those four and win the bowl game to get the program’s fourth straight eight win season.  My sense, right now, is that is a workable result.  My gut, however, tells me that Jim Grobe will figure out a way to out-scheme Everett Withers.  That same gut feeling also tells me that this UNC team is not good enough to win in Raleigh.  Pair those two losses with a probable loss at Blacksburg (which, by the way, would leave the Heels in a tailspin after five straight losses) and the Duke game is for a possible bowl.  I say “possible” because a 6-6 UNC isn’t very attractive after losing five straight.

We’ll see how it plays out, but today (and last week vs. Louisville, and two weeks ago against ECU, and three weeks ago vs. Georgia Tech) was not good.  The opponents get better.  Will Carolina?