Hate Blogging After A Loss

Two days after Carolina lost on the road to Wake Forest and I have to drag myself to this blog (but hey, my eight readers have been hounding me . . . well, at least seven of them have).

The game is old news by now.  The silver lining is that Carolina played terrible, on the road, against a top 5 team, and yet only lost by 3 points.  And, when the season began, if there was a game that Carolina was likely to lose, it was this one.  

Still, watching Carolina play badly is disturbing.   But not so much for the loss.  Carolina basketball means something, and one of those things is you don't take what the defense gives you.  Rather, you do what YOU want to do.  That sentiment was coined and put into practice by Dean.   Another Dean-ism is the best shot is the shortest shot.  The three-pointer is important, but it is NOT Carolina basketball.  

Against Wake, Carolina and especially Lawson and Ellington, took what Wake gave the Heels.  Instead of pounding the ball inside to Hansbrough et. al. Lawson kept the ball on the perimeter too much, and late the entire team - even Hansbrough! - got way too three happy.  Carolina was way too passive and let Wake do what Wake wanted to do.

The only Tar Heel who played like a Tar Heel was Danny Green.  On offense he took threes when it was a good shot, but also penetrated, played the passing lanes and was great on defense.  He played and thought and reacted like a Tar Heel. No one else did.

Will Graves and Larry Drew had good stretches.  Graves' three point play gave Carolina a 57-54 lead, a play I expected to spark a typical game-clinching run that is a Tar Heel trademark.   Drew flashed some offense but was especially strong on defense.  

Finally, besides the straying from Dean-inspired Tar Heel ball, the other disturbing thing about the loss - and I mean earth-shaking, cold-sweat disturbing - was watching our two best players - Hansbrough and Lawson - look bad and discombobulated for 40 minutes.   

Hopefully it's a one game thing; Hansbrough will bounce back.  But I'm close to pushing - well, actually not that close - the panic button on Lawson. He's been completely dominated in both losses, on the defensive and offensive ends.  Against Wake, foul trouble - on two terrible calls - hurt his play on D.  But he needs to pick it up.  He was the best Heel early in the season when he was incredibly focused - on both winning a championship and playing for an NBA contract.   But that play disappeared against Tyrese Rice and Ed Teague.  Here's hoping Ty gets his mojo back on Thursday in Charlottesville.

Other Hoops Notes

• The referees were terrible in that game.  Way too many fouls and no flow to the game, a college game that did not go into overtime yet took 2 and half hours to play.  I don't think the officiating hurt Carolina.  It was simply a poorly officiated college basketball game.
• I assume folks caught one of the most shocking basketball scores since last year, when Maryland lost to American at home, when the Terps lost at HOME to Morgan State, a marginal team from the MEAC (Coppin State they ain't).  It's going to be hard for Gary Williams to keep his job if they miss the NCAA tournament this year. 
• One last Terp note.   The Morgan State game was the fourth Maryland game I've watched this year, so I feel confident in stating that Greveis Vasquez is the dumbest player in the ACC.  The Post had a article on Vasquez that highlighted how much he dislikes the Maryland fans in College Park, and how often he curses at the student section.  I may be going out a limb here, but I don't think Dean (or any other ACC coach in the league today) would condone that kind of behavior.
• The Morgan State game was on the same night that BC lost at HOME to Tommy Amaker's Harvard team.  An embarrassing night for the ACC.  Not only are those two schools hoops nobodies but they are coached by failures like Amaker and Morgan State's Todd Bozeman, the disgraced former coach at Cal.
• As bad as Carolina played on Sunday, our hometown Wizards looked much worse the night before in losing to Raymond Felton and Larry Brown and the Charlotte Bobcats.  I went to that game with Evan and my man Ed "Go Huskies" Mierzwinski.  The Wizards looked good for most of the game, especially young guns JaVale McGee and Nick Young, but also Javartis Crittendon.  The Wizards had great looks down the stretch, and in the last two minutes every player on the floor - Jamison, Butler, Blatche, James and Young - each missed open and good shots.
  
  But the game wasn't lost in the last minute, they lost it in the fourth quarter when Raymond Felton came back in after spraining his ankle.  He dominated (4 assists, 4 points, 3 assists in the last 7 minutes or so) and set up his teammates. The inability to get our All Stars good shots is the biggest problem with the Wizards.  The 'Zards start journeyman Mike James at point, and it's not working. I'd go with Crittendon and Young, with Butler, Jamison and Blatche, in the line up and use James, McGee, etc. off the bench. The bad point guard play hurts this team offensively and defensively, and did so against the Bobcats on Sunday and in another loss to Milwaukee on Monday.  Yeesh.
  

Quick Music Note

I vote in an annual music poll organized by a fellow activist here in DC.  This year my selections for best music were all singles.  I couldn't think of a single long-playing record I really liked.   Here is my list of top singles/music for 2008, in no particular order:

Golden Age - TV on the Radio.  Rips off baselines from my favorite record of 2007 by LCD Soundsystem, but cool and accessible hooks.
100 Yard Dash - Rafael Saadiq.  Great neo-soul hook and love the back up dancers in the video; song is too short.
Vote for Hope - MC Yogi. Obama theme song.
Strange Overtones - David Byrne and Brian Eno, from my favorite album of the year.  Self described as folk gospel or something pretentious like that; great phrasing by David Byrne.
L.E.S Artistes - Santogold. Funky and quirky and hooky and syncopated and sung by a cool girl.
Untouched - The Veronicas.  Sounds like the 80s without sounding like the Killers ripping off the 80s.
That's Not My Name - The Ting Tings. Stupid by oh so hooky, great hooks, great name, stuck in my iPod all fall.
Ain't No Stoppin' Us Now - McFadden and Whitehead. Stuck on heavy rotation ever since the election, but not a new release.