Let's see - Carolina's last 3 games have been: ugly win (at Virginia); ugly win (at home vs. Virginia Tech); the most horrendous of them all, tonight's ugly loss to a uninspiring Georgia Tech team in Atlanta.
A game so terrible as tonight's 20-point loss takes all - at least almost all - the shine off those two ugly wins. The Heels never looked like the Heels tonight. They were incredibly passive to start the game, for the second game in a row. We did not feed the post; Henson and Zeller had 6 shots combined in the first half. Our perimeter defense was terrible, and we let a relatively short Tech team out muscle us down low.
Even our new savant, Kendell Marshall, had a bad game with 5 turnovers (a couple of really bad ones, too).
It was a total breakdown. Carolina shot 27 percent for the game, 20 percent for the second half. Georgia Tech punched us in the face, and we had absolutely no response, from anyone. No one had even a semi-decent game for the Heels.
Is this a pattern? Against the teams from the Old Dominion the come-from-behind victories looked good, and were symptoms of toughness and tenacity. But when you follow those two performances with tonight's stinker, you start to worry about the 2010 Heels.
The troubling thing is that in 3 ACC games the Heels have failed to play with much urgency or smarts, at least for 40 minutes. Against Virginia we did for the first 5 minutes, and the last 6. Against Virginia Tech is was for the last 4 minutes of the first half, and the last 8 of the second. Tonight against the Yellow Jackets, in front of a 50/50 crowd by the way, we had one decent stretch when the subs came in after 3 minutes, for about 5 minutes.
So my very rough calculations have us playing 28 decent minutes, in 3 games, out of a possible 120.
Maybe I'm over reacting; it's only one game, ugly wins are still wins, and we're 2-1 in the conference with a road victory. And perhaps I should not devalue those two wins. Virginia won half a game AT Duke over the weekend so they aren't THAT bad. And the Hokies are semi-legit, a top-50 team according to the RPI.
Perhaps best of all, Clemson comes to the Dean Dome on Tuesday, a team the Heels have never lost to in Chapel Hill.
That game will be huge, however. A good night of shooting, rebounding and running, a playing smart will go a long way to cure all the ills from tonight's loss. This team needs to get it's confidence back, and hopefully that will happen against the Tigers.
That WILL happen if Carolina acts like Carolina. We need to feed the post, for two reasons. One, that's Carolina basketball, go low first, then pass it out if nothing's there. And two, for the 2010 Heels that's where are scorers are.
This team has talent, especially in Henson, Zeller, and Barnes. Those guys, especially Henson and Z, need lots of touches. Tonight that didn't happen, and there were similar stretches against the Cavaliers and Hokies. Fix that and everything will get better, and we won't have nights where the Heels shoot 27 percent.
Of course, that issue begs THE BIG QUESTION: Marshall or Drew II? I would keep doing what Roy has been doing, at least for one more game. It will be hard to keep starting Drew, however, if he continues to fail to get the Heels into their offense, and fails to feed Z, Henson, and others. He's been in Chapel Hill for 2 and a half seasons. He should be better, and that needs to happen soon.
1 comment:
You have to give Roy the benefit of the doubt; he didn't win 2 national championships in 6 years with smoke and mirrors.
Our biggest problems are on offense where we can't seem to consistently feed the post or make a jump shot. So maybe replace Drew II with Marshall to create some kind of flow. But I'd rather see McDonald replace Strickland, a shooter for a non-shooter, than swapping Drew for Marshall in the starting line up.
But clearly 3 of our best 5 players are Zeller, Henson and Barnes. Bullock, Knox and Watts do not merit starters minutes, but McDonald might, and Marshall needs to get 15+ a night.
Post a Comment