“The fat lady ain’t singing but she is humming like hell”
-Arkansas coach Nolan Richardson during the 1995 NCAA Tournament
If the loss at Georgia Tech did not do this season in, then losing to a team that has defeats to Harvard and Maine on their schedule dropping the Heels to 3-9 in the ACC would most certainly do the trick. During the postgame we got the first acknowledgment from the players and coaching staff that winning the ACC Tournament is the only path to the NCAA Tournament for this team and barring the NCAA restoring the eligibility of Ty Lawson, Wayne Ellington and Brandan Wright, that is not likely to happen.
In terms of this game, it was one like the loss at Virginia Tech where UNC played well enough but still made enough mistakes during which they allowed Boston College to go on an 18-7 to assume control of the game. From there it was UNC trying to make plays to get back over the hump but coming up short. Overall, it was a better effort but many of the same issues still cropped up. UNC only committed 11 turnovers but some of them were as head scratching as how lint ends up in your belly button. Tyler Zeller twice threw the ball away completely unforced by the defense. Larry Drew continues to have trouble finding that point where he should stop penetration in order to make a good decision with the ball. Also, the shooting continues to be bad. As a team UNC shot 39% but worse than that Deon Thompson and Tyler Zeller were a combined 8-25 from the floor. John Henson managed a respectable 5-10 but overall the interior shooting was awful. I am less antsy if your perimeter shooting is cold like that but shots in the paint should pull a higher percentage yet that is not the case for UNC.
At this point it has finally dawned on me how wrong we all have been in trying to figure this team out. Some blame the PG. Some blame the guards in general. Others of you harp on the game coaching, player effort, weak interior play, poor offensive execution, turnovers, porous defense and too much use of Twitter. Guess what? It is everything. A team that is 14-13 is and 3-9 in the ACC has a litany of issues not just one or two. If it were just Drew’s play or how Roy handles the personnel or timeouts then we would be partying like it is 1999. Instead it is a cross between 2002 and 2003. So we can certainly sit around and draw a bead on one issue over the other but in the final analysis what ever scapegoat we have decide to beat with a rake handle today is only part of the epic fail this season has been. Yes, one position, such as PG, can be a poison to the whole system but just because said poison causes paralysis in the hand doesn’t mean the hand was all that great to begin with. As I said 14-13 teams don’t get to be there because of one or two issues. It is widespread and complicated further by the injuries and that is really all there is to it.
Speaking of injuries. David Wear apparently hurt his hip and only played eight minutes. Tyler Zeller returned and while he was a bit rusty and did not shoot well, Zeller did manage eight trips to the FT line and grabbed seven boards, six of them offensive. Zeller also had two blocks. I would like to think that had Zeller stayed healthy he could have been a huge plus alongside Ed Davis. I would not go as far as to try and quantify how many wins Zeller might have been worth. I would have liked to at least gone through the season with him in there to see if it mattered.
And Roy is basically saying what most of us have been feeling much of the season:
I feel like that’s a bunch of B.S. By golly, if you’re going to be a basketball player, be that. If you’re going to be afraid, come over there and sit down. I tried to be a psychologist for half the year, now it’s just, ‘You’ve got to get it done.
Heels get FSU next. Anyone want to lay odds on who Ryan Reid ends up injuring his time?
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Not me.
I have thought that reducing Ginyard for the first six weeks of this calendar year would help our competitiveness, but beyond that, I am just not sure that any of these guys should be expecting much playtime in the future, with a couple of exceptions.
If this were ten card draw poker, at this point, I would keep Zeller, Henson and Drew. I would be throwing back both Wears, Strick, Leslie, and Davis (throwing him up or wherever).
I hope to be wrong, but that is the way I see it. David Noel was a walk-on and neither of the Wears will ever be as good as David Noel was his last two years. Leslie McDonald will not be as good as Melvin Scott was. Dexter Strickland will be a better offensive player than Quentin Thomas but he will not be much better overall, if as good as Quentin was at his best.
Henson will be a player. If he can start making free throws, I can see him being a lot like that kid at UConn was last year, with the big frame. Zeller can be a Bobby Jones type player, but taller, if he can stay healthy. Drew will never be Ty Lawson, but he might be good enough to start in the ACC.
I know Drew and Zeller are technically sophomores but they feel like freshmen, so I include them here. Ed Davis will never be back and given his level of apparent interest this year, I won’t be missing him much.
This class is going towards ending up being the worse recruiting class containing three or more recruits in UNC history.
I won’t believe anything anyone says now about the guys coming in, until they get out there on the court. JamesOn Curry certainly had a lot more talent than Quentin Thomas. I really hope that Roy has not fallen into some sort of hubris where he thinks he can just not go after the Currys and Walls of the world because he can turn the Quentin Thomas’s and Leslie McDonalds into stars.
I do think this was mostly a one year recruiting fiasco, but we are still not very far into the Roy Williams-UNC recruiting experience, so I am basing that on the fact that he obviously got good recruits most years at Kansas.
We won last year. Wake Forest has never won the national title. Wake Forest hasn’t made the Final Four in my lifetime. So, Roy can get away with this year being so completely unacceptable.
But, he must go forth from now on knowing, that together with the two titles, he has now presided over the most disappointing season in Carolina history since Frank McGuire made us a national power.
And for all the people who disrespected Coach Guthridge, well, he is looking a heck of a lot better right now.
There is probably some league rule that requires the coach to appear at these post-game press conferences, but I honestly wish Roy would stop. Why doesn’t he take his own advice: “[I]t’s just, ‘You’ve got to get it done.’”
Getting it done doesn’t mean talking about it.
No one can deny Roy’s record. But I doubt that any serious fan could, or would, deny that he has bungled the team this season. Assuming arguendo that the team is not as talented as it was thought to be, it is still more talented than its record.
Roy would help himself out, and the rest of us too, with less talk and more wins. In fact, we’ll get neither.
Except for saddling his assistant coach with the losses, maybe K did the right thing back in 1995. I do think that Roy had some issues with hubris this year, judging from some of the things in his book, to fangate and to some of his coaching decisions.
I hate to say it, but it is refreshing (except for us UNC fans) to see a Calhoun and Williams have seasons like this one. It certainly has put to rest a lot of those “well, I will trust the guy with 2 national titles” rebuttals here on the site.
Larry Brown may be the best X’s and O’s guy in the NBA, but he has but one title. Many would say that the Los Angles Lakers of 1971, with Wilt and Jerry West and Gail Goodrich were the greatest team in NBA history, but most of Bill Sharman’s issues that year were keeping his stars’ heads together.
william, not sure if I’m reading your first post right. Are you suggesting that Coach Guthridge was or could ever be a better coach than Coach Willaims? Nothing against Coach Gut, but he rode Coach Smiths players to the final four. Coach Gut had a red hot shooter for his second final four run in a guy named Forte. And recruiting please. Coach Williams is 99 times the coach that Coach Guthridge was. I understand were upset about the season and with all our NCAA wins we just want to put our two cents in. But we should all stay off the pipe before posting. Go Heels
Didn’t watch the game yesterday, and I’m glad I didn’t—with the weather this winter, yesterday seemed like a Caribbean breeze, and was a perfect day for golf.
I try to take the view that things are never quite as bad, or as good as they may seem. Frankly, the 05 and 09 teams VASTLY under-performed at times (individually & collectively).
05, despite attempts to paint Illinois as a powerhouse, should have put that Title game away in the first half.
Last year, imo, Wake Forest had the better personnel, but Wake fans haven’t trashed Dino to my knowledge. But the bottom line is, our guys came away with 2 Titles, which says the man is doing something right.
If you check back in the archives like THF suggested, you’ll find that there were similar developmental issues with players and teams on their way to greater things. Granted this year has been a meltdown like no other, but there were similar points with those other teams, where there were tilting points that could have gone the other way had they not changed the momentum. Unfortunately, when you don’t get it turned, you are dealing with a whole different dynamic, and your a** is truly up against the wall. There are lessons for all in a season like this, not the least of which are the fans. I for one am as disappointed in some of the fans, as I am the players this season, but I hope to see improvement from both next season. I am pretty sure the players will show a big jump.
I just wonder if Roy pulled a Coach K (gasp!) last year and recruited players that fit a particular profile instead of getting the most talented players who wanted to come to UNC? Henson has eye popping talent – I’m glad we got him, and I’m sure all of the other top programs wanted him too. But I have a hard time envisioning where the Wears and MacDonald will fit into the rotation in the future. I’m sure they’ll be around for four years, and maybe that was the point of getting them(?), but I don’t see what skills they bring to the table. Could we not have just pocketed one of those scholarships so we could offer it to CJ Leslie this year, or has Roy decided he is going to let Kentucky have all the good recruits from Raleigh from now on?
the thing that sticks out to me in these posts is that there are a few people that seem to really have it in for the Wears.
theyre freshmen. theyve played in the neighborhood of 10min/game for the majority of the year. theyve got a decent shooting touch, they scrap, they already have some muscle on their frames. how bout we at least give em a chance before trading them to some DII team?
^I don’t have it in for the Wears – I’m just wondering if they are the most talented players that we could have gotten. That is all.
with the 5-star talent they already had lined up, some of whom would certainly not last 4 years, it seemed like a no-brainer to get two 6’9″ big bodies with above average basketball IQs that probably had a 95% chance of staying all 4 years when they were recruited.
am i missing something else?
I’ve never thought this year was about lacking an essential element from which everything would flow, you know, such as ” the PG is the engine of the team” or “if we just had a go-to scorer”. That’s why , as cliche as it has become, I rather like the characterization of a perfect storm in which so many things are wrong, and went wrong, with a perplexing cumulative effect. The cycle has been seemingly impossible to break. And this group of players, at this time, for whatever reason, is not really capable of breaking it.
But I also think it’s premature to do a throw-away with most of this years’ recruiting class. Let’s put some time and distance between this year and next. Let them think about what just happened and what they can personally do to make themselves better. Learn to be better free throw shooters. Improve their strength. Think about an increased committment to effort and excellence.
And let the new recruits, good ones I truly believe, come in to provide some competition and maybe a missing spark.
I think we’ll see an entirely different team next year, and I think Roy will approach the season differently too. (I hope he’s learned some lessons …and I think he likely has). I’ll say one thing – even though Marcus and Deon will be conveniently gone, and not have to be considered part of the loyalty concept, I suspect rewards next year will shift more to who really performs. I hope so. I’m also in the camp that has put much more of what has happened this year on the players than on the coaching staff. I mean, my gosh, there’s only so much a coach can do to teach, prepare, and motivate these guys. The rest is up to them.
The Wears stats this year are not altogether different than Thompson’s and Stepheson’s were as freshmen and not surprisingly, they were rated pretty similarly as HS seniors. Stepheson and Thompson had RSCI ranks of 39 and 43, while the Wears were 37 and 38.
Deon and Alex both developed into players who can be valuable contributors to very successful teams, assuming the right talent is surrounding them.
^indeed.
i can easily see both of them being very solid and dependable players, especially as juniors and seniors.
i see them being those guys that get a key rebound, a loose ball, that draw a foul, and that shoot 75% or more from the FT line.
i expect to see them in late game situations often in the 2nd half of their careers here.
we arent talking a pair of Pat Sullivans, and he was out there on the court plenty.
^HTTE – The other option would have been to just not use up one of the scholarships last year and use it to try to get someone else this year.
^^The Wears are also hurt by the McD AA-tag, but what people fail to realize is that most of the top PF/C prospects last year were located in the East, and for some reason the selection committee feels a need to make this a East versus West game, when they should really just take the best players and divide the teams evenly.
^^Raj, there are certainly players that you can make that argument about, but IMO, the Wears and McDonald are not it. What may have hurt UNC in the past (and currently) is the scholarships it has given to in-state players like Copeland, Graves, and Watts. For instance, if UNC, after signing elite classes in 2005 and 2006, had held tight with final scholarship offers to Copeland and Graves, they would have had 3 scholarships to offer in 2007, so even though they lost out on Love, they could have brought in a couple of more legit perimiter players who would greatly benefited this team as juniors.
I guess the perspective I’m taking here is that one of the top recruits in the country (CJ Leslie) is right down the road in Raleigh. There are no rumblings about his “shoe fitting” attibutes like there were with Wall. Kentucky is thriving, (while we are struggling) in part because we already let them come into our own backyard and scoop up one very talented player. Its going to really suck if that happens two years in a row.
well, such as who, Raj?
i dont recruit, i dont see the kids play, or their character on the bench in high school, or talk to their teachers. the McD AA label never even crosses my mind. i’ve never in my life bragged that we have x number of McDAAs or taken a jab at any other team about their lack of success with them, or their entire lack of them.
i see two guys that run the floor, that dive on the floor, that appear to be pretty smart out there, that dont need to gain 30 lbs, and that will last all 4 years. they already display grit, and a shot thats fundamentally sound. David is 8 of 16 from 3. i’d be shocked if these guys werent money from FT line in by junior year.
who are the other players out there that we passed over, or that we didnt wait for? if we saved the scholarships, who was playing the last month with Z and now Ed out of the lineup?
CJ isnt as big, is he? would he play the same position? is he one and done? maybe he doesnt make the grades. and isnt there a scholarship available anyway?
i’d rather NOT win an NCAA title than win it like KY wants to, with one and done players.
do you think, once he’s gone, Wall will truly give a rat’s rump about the history and family of Ky’s basketball program? HELL no. i dont want players that see us as a stepping stone.
Ky fans might get to cheer, but there isnt any depth to the warm feelings. they know what they have there. they know they dont have a relationship with the players coming through there. i wouldnt remember a John Wall half as long as i’d remember a Steve Hale or Ed Cota.
i want players that show up for a 100 year alumni game by the busload.
^I have not heard one negative word about CJ Leslie’s character – nothing at all to suggest that he has the same attitude as Wall.
As far as the one and done aspect – should I presume that you feel the same way about Marvin Williams and Brandon Wright – because they seemed like pretty decent kids to me despite their decision to leave after just one year (and Brandon came back for the first Alumni Game – not sure about the second one)?
i dont have a problem with them, because i saw a clear difference in the way they carried themselves than i see in some of the one and doners around the country.
my particular quirk on athletes is that i cant stand a cocky one. dont give me constant headbobs, and chest bumping and thumping, and prancing after you do something.
college player, nba player, baseball player, golfer, whatever.
UNC players carry themselves a certain way with rare exception. there’s a reason Rasheed Wallace is in my top 5 least favorite Heels.
we dont whine after every foul (see team down the road for the last 25 years). we dont pout (see DeMarcus Cousins the other day when he was having a rough game).
i havent heard anything about Leslie’s character either, but i’m guessing Roy didnt just forget he played right down the road, so he has some reason. could it be a misjudged reason? sure. Roy is human.
Ryan Reid will not injure anyone because no one really plays hard enough!! When you are 2 points down in the final 2 minutes of the game, would any other team allow an uncontested lay-up without committing a foul? But that’s what Deon Thompson did yesterday, that’s how uncompetitive this team is. Maybe it is the nature of the coaching, or maybe it’s the nature of the leadership, but this team has no swagger (or ever had one for that matter), this team never commits hard fouls. Look at all the competitive teams out there, Villanova, Georgetown, Syracuse, Kentucky, Kansas, even teams like Vanderbilt, Maryland and Duke, there are never any free lay-ups, no free lunches. Against UNC there is a free feast!! So don’t worry Ryan Reid won’t hurt anyone, because UNC will fold on its own accord in the presence of Ryan Reid and Solomon Alabi.
^Ok – I see your perspective. I only brought all of this up because earlier in the year I heard Roy was recruiting CJ and only stopped recruiting him after he started feeling confident that we were going to get Barnes (And, therefore, would not have any scholarships left)
RAJ, I am pretty sure everyone would have been singing a different tune if Wall, Bledsoe and Cousins were playing for UNC and we were having a winning season. On the flip side I would have to give kudos to John Calipari that he can have difficult players on his team and still get the maximum out of them.
As far as head-cases go, I think these guys have forgotten Rashad McCants!!
You know it’s a bad time for Tarheel Nation when we are wondering what players to keep in a game of draw poker.
I still like Larry Drew and believe in him, especially since this is only his sophomore season and he has such a bad team around him.
I like Will Graves effort and attitude out there. Not a great player, and painfully slow, but he’d be a good role/bench player for any team.
Zeller’s got the goods, and he is getting more and more aggressive, so maybe he will be a stabilizing force in the next few years.
Henson is a tremendous athlete and shows great potential, but he is a project player, and I don’t see him as a real dominant star until (maybe) his junior season.
Strickland is a real player, and I think he would be blossoming if he had good leadership from the upperclassmen.
The Wears are very solid guys who will help this team tremendously in the next few years. They will provide good leadership as juniors and seniors.
Let’s hope Barnes and Bullock are half as goos as the hype!
^^^^this reminded me of an observation i would make 15 years ago, about Dean Smith teams.
we wouldnt be too high or too low, emotionally.
which worked out great for a 30 game season. but in tournaments, there were times i wanted to see more fire and urgency, and i’m not sure the even keel method served us well in those situations.
i wonder if there was anything to that observation.
re: Wall, Bledsoe, etc and singing a different tune. not me. not this fan. thats “rented” title. thats empty. to me, anyway.
re: McCants. its my unqualified opinion that Rashad has/had a diagnosable mental issue that Doherty was either not aware of, or overlooked. at least he stuck with it. not like Joe Forte.
UNC seemed to be on Leslie’s list, at least until the fall signing period, and it appears Roy was after him. This is a 2k Sports post from a Leslie interview dated June 17, 2009:
HighSchoolHoop: You visited North Carolina recently, right?
C.J. Leslie: Yes.
HSH: How did that go?
CL: It went real good. I had a chance to see the campus and everything like that and I played with the guys there. I really liked everything about the school.
HSH: Did you meet with North Carolina head coach Roy Williams?
CL: Yeah.
HSH: Did he offer you?
CL: Well, you know how Roy is … If I was planning to go ahead and commit now it would be fine. I told him I wasn’t ready to decide, and he said that he would just continue to recruit me. He said if I were in a hurry we could’ve went ahead and made this happen. But for now he said he’s just gonna keep on recruiting me.”
______________________
Now this is early last summer. And, as we know, we ended up signing Harrison Barnes in the fall and that’s when Leslie dropped off the list. (Out of scholarships) Interestingly, it appears that if he had committed before the fall signing period, we wouldn’t have gotten HB. Of course that’s if you believe Roy did, or would have, offered him a scholarship.
As far as saving a scholarship for future use, if you can come up with at least a reasonably good prospect, most coaches aren’t so inclined to do that with all the unpredicability of recruiting and early departures. Or so it seems to me.
^ Oh so you don’t want players with a little attitude. Fine, let me point this out to you, very recently Harrison Barnes was given a technical for unsportsman like conduct because he dunked on another player just to prove a point. So what do you think Roy should do if that happened again at UNC, run that kid till it takes all the competitive edge and swagger out of him because it is not the “UNC way” as you say (which I don’t believe, because Dean had many more hard-nosed players than we count on our fingers)? or should he let it pass because it is the ruling of an overzealous official?
i imagine, if it were something done in poor sportsmanship, and given theres probably a speech given about that at the start of every season, he’d be yanked out of the game.
Barnes looks like a very smart kid who’s capable of playing with good sportsmanship.
i would disagree that eliminating those type behaviors also means removing a player’s competitive edge. looked like Tyler and Co had plenty of that last year.
In other words you believe any player who plays with a competitive edge and swagger on the court should not be allowed to play because it’s not the UNC way. Well, good luck winning another NC without players like that!!
hm, maybe reading comprehension is leaving something to be desired here.
competitive edge is not the same as behaving cocky.
Noel was competitive. Montross was competitive. Jordan was competitive. Felton. Ty. Wayne. Tyler.
all managed to win without popping their jerseys or running their mouths.
so, i’m not sure how you read what i said as i want noncompetitive players, but that would be inaccurate.
One of our most fan-favorite video clips , and one that got a huge applause at the Celebration of a Century event, was Stackhouse’s memorable windmill dunk against Duke, followed by a little head-bobbing strut. Just the right amount at the right time, and hardly the way Jerry was all the time.
And, yes, I agree that this is not a requirement for, nor indicative of, being competitive. But a little of it can really help define important moments in important games. If overdone, though, it loses its effect and becomes gratuitous theatrics.
^right. it wasnt a pattern of behavior by any stretch of the imagination. the dunk was a 10. you get a pass when you do something exceptional. and he didnt direct his after dunk strutting in someone’s face.
Jordan, while he was HERE, played within the system and within the Way, if you will. never did i think, while he was HERE, that Jordan was a cocky SOB, like i would later when he was in the pros. thats almost inevitable when youre the most talented player on the planet, by a wide margin.
^^Let’s what you said before:
Now go back to the number of times there were chest bumping thumping etc after Ty scored a contested lay-up last year, or Danny did, or Tyler did. One of the best dunks in recent history is that of Danny at Duke, where he hung from the rim and jawed at Paulus (thankfully he did not get a T for that) and Wayne’s swagger after a lay-up immediately after. That is the competitive edge. But if you must let me go back all the way to Brad Daugherty who told Jay Bilas that he will beat him around like a dog before the UNC-Duke game. Even MJ and Vince would jaw at players during a game. Guess what no one cares about those things, because those players were competitive and competitive players show their edge. If you want goody two-shoes you will end up with something like this year’s team.
Well, same problems as usual. Not finishing around the basket and no half-court offense. Difference is, I was playing bingo with baby gifts at my cousin’s shower.
As for Reid, 2:1 it’s one of our inside guys. Somebody’s going to get smacked in the head.
i stand by what i said, and i’ll leave it up to the other posters to comment on how cocky or swaggery our players are or have been.
myself, i recall next to no Jordan jawing while he was in a UNC uniform. dunk after dunk, i remember him just heading back on D.
dunking on someone in a Dook game is a different circumstance than strutting after a made 3 vs the college of no one, like a Vasquez.
scoring a TD in a big game is different than doing a dance for stopping a RB after a 3 yd gain, when you just gave up 2 first downs, and are about to give up 2 more, which i see all the time.
let your play do the talking. dont draw attention to yourself, “look what i just did”.
thats just me. if it isnt you, thats cool.
Plenty of Wake Forest people have been upset with Gaudio. My feeling is that most people in the know believe that Wake had comparable talent to UNC last year but Gaudio was unable to manage the personalities.
In terms of Guthridge’s coaching ability, I guess Dean Smith must be on the “pipe” as someone said, since he certainly held Guthridge’s coaching ability in the highest regard. There were recruiting issues under Guthridge that actually started during the latter part of Smith’s tenure, but that has nothing to do with coaching ability. A lot of it had to do with Duke getting re-energized and having an amazing run from 1997-2004.
I don’t think anyone is saying that the Wears will not be contributors over four years. They may each turn out to be better than Pat Sullivan, although I would have hoped with the hype that they would have been more like a Serge Zwikker. The real issue is that we got two of them, when we didn’t need two, to begin with. Then comes the fact that we now appear to need immediate help down low, both this year and next, and they just are not going to do it.
I understand that Roy probably thought he was loaded down low and so he could bring in a couple of decent four year guys, but it just doesn’t make sense given how much we misinterpreted the talent level of our bigs. We need impact big guys now, not somebody who will average 10 points and 6 boards when he is a senior.
For the life of me, I simply do not understand why the two of them did not go to a Mid-Major school where they could have had an immediate impact not only this season, but where they could have become seminal players in a program’s development. Maybe that is not what they wanted and it is their life, (lives) obviously, but I hope the Wears were not expecting to be like Stanford’s Lopez twins only at UNC, because those guys were dominant, impact players.
^I almost used the NFL as my “poster child” for unwarranted celebration and gratuitous theatrics.
I wonder if anyone thinks Roger Federer is not competitive. He’s a very laid back guy but he’ll kick your butt in a heartbeat.
I love all of the amateur psychologists on here.
Roy recruited a bunch of role players, same as he did in 06, except Danny turned into a great player, and Tyler was well Tyler.
If we were shooting lets say 75% as a team from the line, we would have an extra 4 or 5 wins this year, and maybe heading into the tournment.
As for cocky players, that is the nature of the generation with all the media coverage. If you want players, they are going to have an air about them. The one thing I always thought Tylers team was that they lacked fierceness, that the big East teams have. When the henderson blasted tyler’s face, no one on our team, got in his face or no hard fouls at anytime in Henderson career. Whenever I am talking to a Duke fan, I use this analogy, Tyler was our version ( a much better version/ champion
of JJ Reddick, dukes golden child. If anyone ever broke JJ face like that, K would of made the whole team pay!! UNC does nothing, as the face of the team got blasted and bloodied.
When Reid, almost broke Ty’s ankle, no one stepped up. Teams always try to beat us up, and no one stands up except for Cope, when he tried to dunk at the RBC and McCalley wasnt having it. I respected Cope for running at McCalley and showing he wasnt a push over, like the starters.
I can not get on the Roy bashing band wagon. Yes he is having a horrible year, but he changed the face of the program in 7 years, has almost won 200 games, and two championship.
Before Roy, UNC hadnt won since 93, Duke was the team of the ACC, and the big Matchup was Duke vs MD, and we were losing to state on a regular basis.
Players Roy brought to UNC: Ty, Wayne, Marvin, Danny, Bobby, Marcus, Deon, Branden, Tyler. That talent was not coming if he wasnt here. Marvin lived in Seattle Washington, and came to play at UNC.
In case anybody is the mood to remember better days, Antawn Jamison is really heating up against Orlando right now.
Marvin Williams had very strong state ties to UNC.
“I simply do not understand why the two of them did not go to a Mid-mMjor”
Top-40 recruits DO NOT go to mid-majors. These are the other schools that gave both of them offers:
Arizona
UCLA
Washington
Stanford
They also drew interest from:
Duke
Kansas
To suggest that they should have gone to a mid-major is completely ridiculous.
“If we were shooting lets say 75% as a team from the line, we would have an extra 4 or 5 wins this year, and maybe heading into the tournment.”
I’ve thought about that too, makeit, and I imagine that’s the conventional wisdom, so I thought I’d check it out.
In the games we have lost by 10 or fewer points, the only games we would have realistically had a chance to win should we have shot free throws much better, we would have only won 2 had we shot 75% , Kentucky and Virginia Tech. Now this survey did not track how many front ends of 1 and 1′s we missed, which could make a much bigger difference, but you kind of have to figure those things even out. A more complete analysis, however, may prove different.
In all our losses we averaged .640 FT% vs .656 FT% for the whole year. So it may be a bit optimistic to think we would have won 4 or 5 more games with improved free throw shooting.
Another thing is some of you seem to have an playground basketball mentality about recruiting as though Roy had a pool of players and he picked from them and in doing so chose the Wears or others over five star guys. I know announcers like to say UNC or Duke does not recruit, they choose but it is not true. Also, the recruiting process starts one, two even three years out from when they actually showed up on campus. Players get pursued based on their interest in UNC and whether Roy thinks they fit into his system. The players themselves being 17 year old kids with their own ideas of what they want also determine UNC’s interest. Roy has a tough, disciplined system and some players might chafe at that, others obviously like it.
In the case of the Wears, Roy believes having two 6-9 forward with face up skills and sound fundamentals will work really well in his system. I think we have already seen signs these guys can be solid as they develop.
Also, you cannot get all five star guys every season nor can you expect every recruit to be a home run. UNC got home runs with Hansbrough, Ellington, Lawson and Green. Even though Hansbrough was #6 in his class, I recall Adam Gold at 850 saying he would at best be Carlos Boozer. He was wrong. Jay Bilas said when he first saw Danny Green in practice he did not know if he would make it. Ellington was wildly inconsistent as a shooter his freshman year to the point I called for Ginyard to start ahead of him. Lawson was Lawson and had he left after his sophomore year I think we would have called his career a mixed bag plagued by injury.
It is possible some of these guys do not pan out but I think they deserve the benefit of the doubt until at least their junior year if they are four star guys and at least their sophomore season if they are considered five star elite recruits.
And as for player attitude. I think the 2009 team was a perfect mix of attitudes. Good character guys all but Danny Green brought a big personality and edge to the team. Remember, Ellington got a tech vs VT in the 2008 ACC semis for running his mouth following a made basket. Hansbrough was fierce and would really get after guys. I think all of those elements are lacking to some degree and these players need to be more aggressive, tougher and find a little edge to their game.
“I know announcers like to say UNC or Duke does not recruit, they choose but it is not true.”
Especially not now. It may have rang more true 20 years ago, when no one left before the end of their Junior years and there was less emphasis in starting from day one. But now, for most top-20 players playing time has almost become the number one requirement.
yes 850: jamison, carter, williams all going at it. here in the last 3 minutes it has been carter vs jamison. quite a treat as i scroll through THF.
Top 40 recruits may not generally go to Mid-majors, but that certainly does not mean they should not. Obviously, each player makes his own choice but there are plenty of guys who would rather play than sit on the bench. Dell Curry’s son did pretty well at Davidson and Bill Bradley did okay at Princeton. Davidson is a great school and I could see the Wears taking Davidson places and becoming icons there. At UNC, on the other hand, they get compared to Pat Sullivan and Kris Lang.
No one to my knowledge, anywhere on this site has said that the Wears “are not solid”. No one has said they cannot or will not contribute. No one has called for anyone to transfer. People are talking about what they see for the future and I don’t think many see the Wears as becoming major stars for UNC. It certainly was a questionable use of two slots for two similar players.
That doesn’t mean the Wears don’t hustle more than anyone else. It doesn’t mean that they are not attractive and both gentlemen and scholars, with good haircuts, to boot. All it means is that if the Wears are starters, or even a significant part of the mix the next three years, I doubt that UNC will be competing seriously for any NCAA titles. Hopefully, I am wrong about both points. I think it would be fantastic and fun to have twin stars. I am far less enthusiastic about twin role players taking up two scholarships.
I know some of you are trying to be positive but every time someone makes a point about anything, we seem to get pointed back to some other period in UNC basketball to try to rebut the point.
First, we were all told early in the season not to worry because the Heels really didn’t start off all that well in 2006 either.
When Syracuse shellacked us, well, the USC game in 2005 in December, was almost as bad.
When we started off bad in the ACC, well, 1997 was a bad start, and don’t forget 2000.
When people on here first started questioning whether UNC was going to make the NCAA tourney, they were basically ridiculed. I mean, except for Matt Doherty, UNC doesn’t miss the tourney. You can look it up.
I understand the need to use stats and I also understand that memories fail, but people also need to use their eyes. Trying to tell people that players from the past weren’t as good as we remember them, might be partially true, but it basically has zero to do with how good this particular group of players is.
Comparing Larry Drew to previous UNC guards was interesting, but it might have been much more to the point to compare him, as someone finally did, to the guys he is playing against in the ACC.
maybe william read things i didnt, but if recruiting the Wear twins got that much hype, i didnt see it. not the hype of Henson, or even Strickland, much less the Lopez twins.
so it would seem that the team behind Tyler had an edge…but not enough of an edge to deliver payback when Tyler was elbowed? hm, ok. somewhere in between.
a side note on the FTs. FTs as pure point differential may not have changed an outcome, but when they were missed, they could have tightened a score, or taken a lead, or interrupted a streak, and then things change, mentally. possibly.
edit: well, william, YOU suggested it would be better for the Wears to go to a midmajor, so we can draw some conclusion other than you dont think they are ACC material? “taking up two scholarships”. i rest my case, your honor.
to that i say…may the Wears dont think its all about them. they could also go to a DII school and average 20 and 10 each. i’d bet they came to UNC for some other reason.
and i dont see any real harm in comparisons to previous UNC guards. note the connection: they played at UNC, under similar or identical systems. its a gentle reminder that maybe we look at our players a little too harshly when they are on or ahead of the curve.
I can see David and Travis diverging as far as their relative talents, and not getting lumped into virtually the same player profile as you always used to see on the high school recruiting sites. (Someone else mentioned that here recently). Travis may eventually be a better rebounder, David a better outside shooter, for example. I’m not saying this in hindsight because I remember thinking it when they committed, but I did find it a bit odd to recruit two players with such a similar mold. Apparently the only way to get them was as a package.
I don’t believe anyone, fans or analysts alike, ever thought the Wears would be “major stars” at UNC from the day they committed. Why should we expect them to be? Do we expect that from all our recruits? What percentage of all the players UNC has ever recruited have become major stars here, even the ones on national championship teams? No, on any given 13 scholarship-player roster you may only have 3 or 4 stars at most. The rest are role players, but necessary for consistent bench play and depth. The question for D & T is, are they ACC-caliber 7,8 or 9-type bench players? If the answer is yes, then they are right where they were recruited to be.
“FTs as pure point differential may not have changed an outcome, but when they were missed, they could have tightened a score, or taken a lead, or interrupted a streak, and then things change, mentally. possibly.”
My point exactly, making free throws does more than add points to the score, it slows the pace down, maybe ends a long opponents run, or just give are guys confidence.
There have been several occasions where we missed the front end and it leads to a basket by the opponents.
i dont know that its fun or fantastic to have twins on the team. i mean, i dont use that line when i’m sitting at the bar or anything.
hey, if twins means theyre on the same page out there on the court, i’m for anything that brings some cohesiveness, at this point.
^the Dook game is a case in point. as i mentioned then, if we hit those free throws when its 45-45, then we have an 8 pt lead 3 minutes later, not a 2 pt lead. down 8, maybe Dook plays just a little different. the 6 pt difference from what could have been from what was, was not enough to win, but it might have made a difference.
If Ed Davis does go pro, I think that we’ll end up appreciating the Wears a bit more. We don’t have a great deal of physical strength in the frontcourt currently and from the recruits coming in the next couple of years there doesn’t appear to be much on the way. The Wears have good strong frames as it is, and are noted for their diligence in the weight room. I don’t have a lot of optimism about them being special, but they may fill roles that no one else on the roster is going to be able to in the coming years.
“Comparing Larry Drew to previous UNC guards was interesting, but it might have been much more to the point to compare him, as someone finally did, to the guys he is playing against in the ACC.”
But that ignores the fact that Scheyer, Delaney, Vasquez, and Kitchen are all upper classmen, and Jackson and Landesberg both played 20+ mpg last season. So sure, in terms of this year’s performance, comparing how Drew is doing to the other ACC PGs is telling, but in terms of where Drew stands going forward, it really doesn’t tell us anything. The list was also a touch inaccurate, as Biko Paris has been the starting PG for BC for their first 25 games, and his ORtg is well below Drew’s.
^maybe theyre twin Alex Stephesons, with more scoring. anything wrong with that?
We need another Rasheed Wallace.
Well if, as LarryS predicts, they become more divergent in their skills and playing styles then having twins gives us the advantage of being able to switch their jerseys ever other game and really screwing up the opponent’s scouting reports
^Or at halftime…
More than once I have thought william was too harsh, but his last post was irrefutable. This part in particular is spot on:
“I know some of you are trying to be positive but every time someone makes a point about anything, we seem to get pointed back to some other period in UNC basketball to try to rebut the point.
“First, we were all told early in the season not to worry because the Heels really didn’t start off all that well in 2006 either.
“When Syracuse shellacked us, well, the USC game in 2005 in December, was almost as bad.
“When we started off bad in the ACC, well, 1997 was a bad start, and don’t forget 2000.
“When people on here first started questioning whether UNC was going to make the NCAA tourney, they were basically ridiculed. I mean, except for Matt Doherty, UNC doesn’t miss the tourney. You can look it up.”
I think it’s beyond serious argument that it became narcotic here to look to past teams for hope each time this season became more clearly disastrous. But past teams with different players simply can’t — and didn’t — tell us anything about this team.
I also must disagree with two of the most astute guys here, 52bgj and THF. 52 says that he’s disappointed in some of the fans. But I don’t know how fans steeped in our tradition could have reacted to this season other than with consternation and, at some points, anger. Could anyone pulling for Carolina really have enjoyed watching this progressive trainwreck? Last year I looked forward to every game. I even signed what I knew was an overly expensive cable TV contract just so I could see the games (in Hawaii, which is where I spend the winter). Over the last couple of weeks, I haven’t even bothered to find out when the games are. I don’t want to see the suffering anymore.
THF says: “It is possible some of these guys do not pan out but I think they deserve the benefit of the doubt until at least their junior year if they are four star guys and at least their sophomore season if they are considered five star elite recruits.”
With all respect, there can only be the benefit of a doubt where there is doubt, and here there is little or none. These guys have spent nearly 30 games showing us their native ability and their basketball instincts and IQ — things that don’t improve, or don’t improve much, year-over-year.
The verdict is there for all to see. Our record against a weakened ACC is 3-9. We didn’t get cheated out of any games. Of all the freshmen and sophmores, only Henson has visibly improved over the season. No one has stepped up. (There was one point at which Strickland stepped up, whereupon he was publicly called out by Roy for taking (and hitting) a key basket, and he hasn’t been the same since).
This is not to say things are hopeless for next season; much to the contrary. Zeller hasn’t really had a chance; the Wears are solid role players (and have some toughness); Drew might yet improve (he has improved a lot from last season); Henson has phenomenal potential that has finally started to show up; the incoming class is very highly rated; etc. So this is not a jeremiad for next season.
But simple mercy would dictate a quick end to this one.
The primary coping mechanism for any fan base, but particularly one with UNC’s history is to use prior seasons as frames of reference. For the sports fan there is always hope until mathematically there isn’t any or you run out of previous reference points.
I’ve been going to every game for over 20 years and, though this year has been difficult, along with the 8-20 season, I still try to find something positive about each contest. Even if it’s nothing but a view of the future for some of the young guys or simply trying to win the next game. I figure if they’re going to show up and try then I will too.
well it would make sense if the team showed some fire, some sense of urgency, some fight, unfortunately it’s hard to be enthusiastic about a team that plays so unenthusiastically.
I don’t have a problem with consternation or anger reaction–I DO have a big problem with marginal calls for a HOF coach to step down, and when that anger becomes obsession to the point of trying to sway peeps to the absolute viability of a player’s potential, when my eyes are telling me different. As to past references, they are indeed relevant as I myself (I can at least admit it) was one of WE’s harshest critics early on, and look how he turned out. I have criticized nearly everyone on this team at various points (including Roy), but because I don’t keep my foot on the gas pedal, it may appear to some I’m pollyannish. I’m a firm believer that the way life works is that the harder you bump your head on the ceiling, the more you may need to back off the trampoline.
THF –
My coping mechanism was to get 6000 miles out of town.
BTW, I sent you a message about the George Karl story, using the “Contact THF” function, but I’m not sure you got it. By using that function, I don’t get a “Sent Messages” entry in my own in box.
Many thanks for your work on this site. There must have been numerous times this season when it drove you nuts.
^mine is a good movie
which one of the all time best sports movies (and one of Paul Newman’s best performances imo) is on Versus network right now: “Slap-Shot”…btw, I would trade the Wear twins for the Hanson brothers.
Big Game –
The problem is that we fans can’t DO anything. We just have to sit and watch (which you wisely avoided yesterday, as did I).
No serious fan could want to axe Roy. The guy was at the helm for two NCAA championships in the last six years. When you lose what he lost after last year, there was no way we were going to resemble what we had become used to. That said, I’m conviced that this was one of the few teams, maybe the only one, he never figured out how to coach. That doesn’t mean he should get fired. It means he should think hard about what he did wrong.
I’m a firm believer that, when you keep bumping your head on the ceiling, it’s time to………..go to the beach.
Big Game –
Then see if you can rent “Fast Times at Ridgemont High.” For a long time after that, Phoebe Cates was my favorite person on this planet.
lol–Spicolli & Ray Walston….and Phoebe with carrots!
very very entertaining hockey game tonight.
Fired? Who said anything about Roy getting fired?
I think I said he had enough good will to make it through three of these types of seasons in a row. I think we all know what usually happens is what happened with Pete Carroll; the coach goes to the pro’s, although Pete Carroll never had a season as horrible as this after his two titles. K sort of did, but recovered quick.
It is true, however, that we are now seeing guys like Fullmer and the football coach at Miami, who both won titles, get axed. Gary Williams, who saved Maryland’s program and got them their only title, is getting heat. That is more due to luxury box seats than anything else.
Thanks for your remarks, Rathskellar.
As you said, people are certainly entitled to look back to previous seasons in hope, but it is a far different thing to present analysis about what UNC teams have done in the past and believe that that is anything but sheer hope and speculation; unless a person is superstitious and believes that somehow what UNC accomplished in the past is hard linked to what it will accomplish in the future.
I saw that hockey game tonight and I felt sorry for Canada because they seemed to have so much more talent and somehow lost by two goals. I guess it does show what a whole lot of desire and effort can do….
Fired? Who said anything about anyone saying fired?
That would be you bgj, “I DO have a big problem with marginal calls for a HOF coach to step down”
Agree for the most part on the 10 card poker reference william, except I’d keep Strickland too until he proves what he can do at his natural 2 guard position full-time.
Also, every team needs role players like the Wears, but I agree with william’s point, Carolina did not need both of them and if they were a package deal then maybe Roy should have looked somewhere else for the 4 year role player. Especially with other pressing issues that needed to be filled with this recruiting class like outside shooting. Someone compared the Wears to Thompson and Stephenson, but you can have 2 role players in a recruiting class when the class also includes stars like Lawson, Ellington, and Wright. Hopefully, the Wears will prove all of us wrong and contribute to the levels of Serge Zwikker instead of Pat Sullivan.
This year is what it is and the players and the coaching staff should both share the burden of blame for this disaster, and the question now is what are they going to do going forward to fix next year. Losing 2 senior disappointments and replacing them with more talented newcomers that have some of the skills that are sorely missing from this team (shooting, athletic ability, and ball handling) will help, but this will not be a quick fix unless the returning core from this current team (DrewII, Strickland, Henson, and Zeller) make drastic improvements and start turning some of that potential into production. But the level of play has declined to the point that Carolina will not be able to allow the 5 star newcomers to wait until their sophomore years to produce as expected. Still more questions than answers for next season, which Carolina fans are not used too.
that is an unacceptable interpretation.
I think the one thing roy should learn from this season is to let the freshmen play. When you have a roster mostly of underclassmen, you have to let them learn from there mistakes. How can a guy get any better when he knows if he messes up then he’s going to sit. I think roy demorlized (sp)this team to no repair. The wear twins are going to be good unc players down the road. We won’t never have a conversation about them leaving early.
I wonder what would kentucky’s record be if roy coached them this year.I’d bet that they would have at least 4 or 5 more defeats. Cal let the freshmen play. He didn’t sit his players after a bonehead play. It messes with the players mind. Benching a player right after he makes a mistake is not the way to make that player better. Thats the main job of the coach is to teach a player how to be better. Not sit his tail on the bench after the fact.