UNC loses focus but wins game against Albany

At one point in last night’s game the Tar Heels were up by over 30 on the Great Danes and had hit on 17 of 21 shots in the second half. Unfortunately that point was about eight minutes before the end of the game and Carolina’s chemistry vanished from there on out. Yes, ninth ranked North Carolina (11-3) did beat Albany (4-10) by the final of 87 to 70, but if it had kept up the pace of the first 12 minutes after intermission the final should have been more like 100+ to 55. And once again this didn’t make head coach Roy Williams very happy, as well as a coach should, since this comes back (once again) to fundamentals.

Carolina took a 46 to 29 lead into the locker room, and honestly the 17 point margin could have been larger if not for a couple of mistakes the Heels had throughout the first half. Nonetheless it was a good lead and we saw good thing from all the Tar Heels on the floor. That lead went from the upper teens to close to 40 points with seven and a half minutes to go (85 to 47). The team was cruising, the chemistry was there, the players were in a rhythm and they seemed to have gelled. All of a sudden, a bad pass, the defensive play isn’t there anymore, Albany begins to hit three’s from anywhere inside the half court line and North Carolina is chucking up bad shots, bad passes or forgetting that the clock is on their side and Albany outscored Carolina 23 to 2 to finish the game.

Sure, to be fair, let’s also say that I think coach Williams knew this game was won as he put in the non scholarship players with two minutes to go in the game and UNC’s lead still sliding away. If Williams had thought this game was in any kind of jeopardy this would have never happened. But what did happen is that a team that was dominating a game, despite having 18 turnovers on the night, lost its focus. End of the story! I personally (and call me homer if you want) think this is due in great part to the fact that a Marcus Ginyard isn’t on the floor to be the floor general in these moments. I could be wrong, but I think a fifth year senior who can handle the ball and is a defensive stopper will slow down the flow of the game and be able to get a needed basket to cut the Albany run.

But what Ginyard can’t help and the Heels need to work on as they head into the ACC schedule is hitting their free throws, since 63% is not going to make it, not in conference play, not in tournament play! Ed Davis, who finished with 18 points and 8 rebounds, and Deon Thompson (15 pts/5 boards) went 7 for 13 from the charity stripe, and that needs to go way up. And while Davis and Thompson were the only two Heels in double digits, three other players scored nine points a piece: Larry Drew, Will Graves and coming off the bench Leslie McDonald. In all nine players got at least 10 minutes of playing time (while two others had 8 and 7), while no one from the team played more than 28.

This team is still a work in progress, we see that with every game and every opponent. It has several things it needs to work on, but also has the skill to be able to fix them. We have to stop thinking about the finished product (the two national championship teams) and focus on the fact that they too had to develop. The `09 team we all love how long were we upset about the Georgetown game that ended the `07 run? Or the Kansas debacle of `08? Or the 0-2 ACC start of the year they won it all? How many people remember that the seniors from the 2005 national championship team were on the 8-20 squad of three years before? Or that team started off with a loss to a small program on the west coast? The `05-`06 team, filled with Hansbrough, Frasor, Ginyard and Green had two losses at the same point in their season, but having played four less games.

So, unlike a lot of fans, or maybe I should say some fans, I do get frustrated, but I also know that this is not the finished product. That will come in a year or two, when a new cycle will have formed, when head coach Roy Williams won’t have to start all over because he has a nucleous of players that have been through it before, when this team has had a full season to know one another and understand what each other’s strenghts and weaknesses are. This is a team that has lost to three undefeated teams that are in the hunt for a Final Four run, and it’s a team that lost four starters to the NBA and is still ranked in the Top 10 and will most likely contend for the top spot in the ACC race. All I can say is this, before getting too mad at this team for the sloppy play (let the head coach get mad) be patient with this squad of very young and talented players.

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