Go Heels!

Negative.

Now that I’ve asked that, on to the game. For 30 or so minutes, I was very pleased with the way the Heels played. Yes, they still have some TO issues, but a lot of those were turnovers made out of effort. They weren’t necessarily lazy play TOs. As the inexperienced players become more comfortable, I believe we’ll see a lot of those TOs turned into positive plays for the UNC offense. When the game is “still in doubt”, this team looks like they really want to put in the effort on the defensive end. When they learn to play defense from tip-off to final buzzer, then they’re going to really begin to look like a top 10 team in my opinion. Also, let’s credit Ohio State a little. They’re not a bad team and have some really good players. They had been attempting runs throught the 2nd half only to be thwarted time and again by UNC making key baskets. I would like to have seen UNC push the game out of reach or at least maintain its working margin. However, to get a scare like that down the stretch may help these young players realize that you can’t let up on a team when you’ve got them down.

Individually, I really liked the play we got from some of our perimeter guys. Marcus Ginyard continues to display offensive skills that we had not seen previously. Will Graves appears to be playing much more intelligently. He doesn’t try to chuck up a shot every single time he touches the ball. Larry Drew is playing a lot better than he did in limited minutes last season. He still has room to improve, but I think we can see the talent is there for him. As for his free throws, I think it was huge that he stepped to the line with a 2 point lead, and drained 2 free throws after going 2-6 on three prior trips to the line. Deon Thompson is a consistent amongst our “bigs”. A double-double against a team that was allowed to play bruising Big 10-style basketball cannot be discounted. Unfortunately, Ed Davis spent most of the game in foul trouble, so he didn’t get to build up the kind of numbers we’d like to see from him. Most of the other players contributed in their spot minutes which I think is important. James Henson also gave us a glimpse of how special he could be on that steal and dunk in the 1st half.

The bad: As previously mentioned, not playing hard defense for 40 minutes. The team didn’t attack the press as well as it could. UNC has the athletes to turn press defenses into fast break opportunities. The turnover number is still high since this team is not yet playing at the pace that we’ve seen the last 2-3 years.

Someone please get Vitale to leave….please.

The only thing that could have made that game uglier last night did. With all the whistles it was bound to be a very ugly contest. Let the guys play for pete’s sake. It’s not about the refs, it’s about the game. They called it equally bad for both sides but that is all the credit I will give them.

“why people keep textin me talkin bout keep ur head…we won im happy s—”

Some kids just get it. UNC appears to have a bunch of them…

Graves had his best game by far. He moved well without the ball and didn’t hesitate when presented with open jumpers. Travis Wear also had a very efficient game in limited playing time. This team is deep and very talented. While it will no doubt have some bumps in the road, it will be very good by March.

That’s what I get for relying on stats that are not finalized. But I was tired. Stupid late games.