We talk constantly about never allowing anyone to catch a length-of-the-court pass for a layup, and yet they did [Gavin Grant’s layup at the end of the first half]. I can’t explain it. We’re too fat and sassy right now. We thought we could win just by showing up, and you can’t do that. Every team in this league is good.
There is going to be adversity all the time, but you can’t just let people jump up and shoot the ball right in your face. There’s a certain amount of toughness needed to play this game. They didn’t give us the trophy last week when we beat Arizona. We went out today and got our butts kicked
Do you think practice in Chapel Hill is going to be a pleasant experience of the next couple of days? I actually think it is going to be a living hell. There are various facets to sheparding a team through a season and developing them. On the technical side of on-the-court play and execution UNC is probably 85% there. Unfortunately what we saw today fell more in the other 15%. Some of the other areas of development have to do with the intangibles such as focus, passion, toughness, and the will to win in the face of adversity. This is the area that tends to be hit or miss with UNC at times and they also tend to show up in a trap game like this where a team is caught looking ahead and not taking the team on the court seriously. Roy's concern, at least by his quotes, is that the Heels tend to shutdown if they get challenged in an unexpected way. The three losses have been similar in that they have been facing a team which shot extremely well but also created problems with the way they ran their offense. The burden falls on the players to psychologically push past what is happening on the court and on the coaches to make the necessary adjustments.
Consider this game another hard knocks lesson for the young Heels and God have mercy on them during practice over the next three days.