It’s UNC vs UAB in round three of the NIT

Bartow Arena

When you do well in life it seems fitting/proper that you should be rewarded. For the Tar Heels doing well in the National Invitation Tournament means that they had a couple of days of practice and travel before playing round three of the tournament. Tonight, at 9:00 p.m. EST (televised on ESPN), 4th seed North Carolina (18-16) will face off against the 2nd seed University of Alabama at Birmingham (25-8) for what is just the second meeting between these teams ever, with the Heels having won it back in 1986 77 to 59. For the winner it means advancing and heading to NYC and the Mecca of Basketball, Madison Square Garden, to take on either Virginia Tech or Rhode Island. For the loser it means the end their season just one step short of the New York city spotlights. In other words both of these teams have plenty to fight play for tonight.

This is certainly no easy task for head coach Roy Williams’ squad as UAB is 14-3 this year at home and has won 33 straight out of conference games at Bartow Arena. The Blazers are keeping up with those numbers in the post season as they have not trailed a second in the 80 minutes they have played of this torunament. Add to all of this that Tyler Zeller is 50-50 on whether he plays or not and you can see how massive of a climb the Heels have in this one.

However this isn’t the same team that we have been used to, so I am definitely not going to give up hope of a good, hard fought, game by Carolina. And the fact that I can sit here and write a post about this team, that plenty of fans had given up on, is one game away from heading to the semis is awesom from where I am standing. If I can talk about the fact that they are going to go to New York city after the game is over would be over the top for me!

One thing is for sure, if the Heels want to win this game they will have to have a good game as far as not turning the ball over, as the Blazers are very good on the defensive side of the ball. Case in point, they held N.C. State to 35.8% shooting (24% in the first half). For a team like North Carolina, that with the exception of the game against William & Mary, hasn’t scored 80 points since December 2009, shooting like this with added turnovers on top will mean a defeat if lucky, an ugly one if not. But UAB is not just about defense, they have two players that UNC must keep from having stellar performances if they want to have a chance to win. Junior guard Elijah Millsap, a 6’6″ guard (which is the type of player that seems to always give trouble to UNC), who leads C-USA in rebounding at 9.4 and is fifth in scoring 15.7. In his last game he scored 27 points, so whomever is guarding him needs to blanket the Blazer from start to finish. Along with Millsap the Heels have to contain senior forward Howard Crawford, 6’8″, who shoots 48.3% from the field, best in the conference and is second in scoring on the team, with 12.0 per game. To recap: pressuring defense and two good offensive players, not an easy task.

On the offensive side of the ball the Heels have to go to their bread and butter, the inside game, because there is no way that Carolina can win this one relying on the outside shooting. This is why Zeller being hurt is very troubling to me, another huge body to throw at the Blazers inside would be great. Nevertheless UNC does have big bodies to play with. Deon Thompson, John Henson and Travis Wear can all chip in and do damage inside for coach Williams. Together they have to combine for 35 points and 20 boards if the Heels want to have a chance to win this game, and that is saying a lot when you think that UAB only gives up 60.4 points per game. But now let’s get to the two players that on offense might just make the difference, Larry Drew II (you can check out his game winning drive against MSU on Tar Heel Fan‘s site) and Dexter Strickland. They must make the correct decisions at all time if they want to come home with a W. That means crisp passing, no easy turnovers that can lead to fast break points for the opposition, look inside first and foremost just to meantion some of the things (I am sure coach Williams has a lot more for them). As far as the scheme of things related to numbers, these two young men need to score about 15-18 points combined and have 10 assists while turning over the ball less than 5 times. That brings us to about 53 points in all, where is the rest going to come from?

Will Graves and Leslie McDonald. They have to take their shots compared to just taking shots. If these two outside shooters can set and shoot properly they can give the Tar Heels what they truly need, some room inside for the big man to operate. Meaning that both of them have to hit early so that the Blazers have to come out and guard them, that is why I said “have to take their shots no just taking shots”. A couple of three’s early on will make the difference whether Thompson, Henson and Company will be double teamed all game long or not. I know that if the UNC’s bigs can have the room to play they can make the difference, but they need help from the back court. And now we come to one of the most talked about Heel this year (and not always in a good way), Marcus Ginyard, and what he needs to do in this one in order to help his team head to the Big Apple for the second time this year. One thing and one thing only, play as hard as he has ever done on D. If he can lead by example on that side of the ball it is going to go a long way in helping the rest of the team do the same and making UAB have to fight a lot harder than they have to in this tournament.

All of this was simple to write, but I know that it’s not as easy to execute. By no means is this game a gimme for UNC, but fortunately, because of this squad maturing and gelling it’s not a gimme for UAB either. I truly think that who wins this game will have to earn it for the major course of the game, and that is going to make for good basketball. The Las Vegas insiders have UAB as a 5 points favorite, which isn’t that big considering the dominance the Blazers have had at home and that Miss State was a 6.5 points favorite to UNC in the second round. Does that mean I think UNC is going to win it? I do, and this is why, I am not going to pretend I know a lot about the University of Alabama at Birmingham because I do not, but I doubt that in their season they have encountered as many bigs that can all score as UNC has. That leads me to believe that their front line might get fouls quickly and open up even more play for the Heels inside.

The final score? I say North Carolina 74 to 68 in a game where Henson dominates inside and shows the rest of the college basketball world what to expect in season from him in season two.

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