University of North Carolina Athletics
Droschak: Turnovers Cost Tar Heels
February 10, 2005 | Men's Basketball
Feb. 10, 2005
y David Droschk, TarHeelBlue.com
DURHAM, N.C. - Remember giving something away as a kid and immediately wanting it back?
That's how the North Carolina Tar Heels feel this morning after sleeping on, well, trying to sleep, on a 71-70 loss at Duke. Twenty-three times the Tar Heels failed to get a shot at the bucket because of costly turnovers. It's hard to beat a CYO team, let alone Duke in Cameron Indoor Stadium, with such shoddy ballhandling.
North Carolina started the high-intensity contest with a giveaway and ended it that way as David Noel watched the ball get away in front of the Tar Heels' bench as the clock ticked to zero.
And there was every sort of turnover in between as the second-ranked Tar Heels (19-3, 8-2 ACC) failed to seize a chance to take control of the ACC race.
"We've got to get a shot in that situation, even if it's a terrible one," Sean May said of the final possession. "We didn't even give ourselves an opportunity."
Coach Roy Williams has warned all season his club needed to take better care of the ball. But a break-neck offensive pace compensated for and somehow masked the problem.
Not on Wednesday night as North Carolina was forced into a 30-foot game by the Blue Devils and forced out of its comfort zone.
"We shot ourselves in the foot," said point guard Raymond Felton. "We didn't run the ball like we were supposed to. This just shows us if we don't take care of the ball against successful teams we're not going to be successful. We've got to do a better job. I've got to do a better job."
Like a football quarterback often does, Felton shouldered much of the blame for the loss.
It's certainly a game Felton would like to forget. He turned it over eight times and failed to get the Tar Heels running with just two fast-break points.
"At times I was slowing the ball down instead of pushing it up the court as fast as I could," Felton said. "The ball was slippery, the floor was slippery. The ball was getting away from me."
Still, a final opportunity was there for the taking. However, Felton picked up his dribble at the top of the key and was unable to find an open teammate in the waning seconds.
"The lane was open and I should have taken it," Felton said. "It was a mistake I made. "I was looking to pass to Rashad and he was covered and then to Sean and he was covered, then the play just got terminated."
In retrospect, this is exactly the type of game the Tar Heels needed after blowing out ACC opponents by an average of 21.7 points.
It was an opportunity to see how much work needs to be done in the half-court and how players will react to close, high intensity, down-to-the-wire games in the NCAA tournament.
"I want the guys know that if we're going to make a run in late March there's going to be a time when the game is going to be tied and we're going to have to make a play," May said. "That's what we have to take from this. Down the line we're going to have to make plays. There are a ton of things we can correct."
Poise is an intangible, something Williams can't draw up on a blackboard of scream out in a huddle. It's a necessity championship teams must acquire from experiences.
It was quite an experience Wednesday night.
"Guys were anxious and we were running a little bit faster than they were used to running and the turnovers happened," David Noel said.
Rashad McCants admitted he may have been too jacked up for this one.
"I was just overly nervous about the game," he said. "Players shouldn't be nervous, but I'm human. I think everybody on the team was nervous. You've got to show up to play. But it's better now than in a month-and-a-half."
Or even in three weeks, when the slugfest comes to Chapel Hill.
David Droschak is the former sports editor for the North Carolina bureaus of the Associated Press, the largest news-gathering organization in the world. In 2003, Droschak was named the North Carolina Sportswriter of the Year. He currently works in public relations at Robbins & Associates International, based in Cary.
