University of North Carolina Athletics
Saint Louis Game Guide
December 22, 2006 | Men's Basketball
Dec. 22, 2006
By Lauren Brownlow
The Basics
No. 2 North Carolina (9-1) is coming off its sixth straight victory over Florida Atlantic on Tuesday night, 105-52. The Tar Heels will play their third game in seven days and the last before Christmas. St. Louis is coming off a 51-50 victory over Missouri State, a team that knocked off Wisconsin in November. The Billikens held Missouri State's leading scorer scoreless. Carolina is the highest-ranked team to visit the Scottrade Center since last season's Gonzaga team (then No. 10) had a narrow 60-57 escape.
Game Time: North Carolina at St. Louis, 7 p.m. ET.
Last Time: Last season, then 23rd-ranked Tar Heels narrowly escaped the Billikens, 75-63, on December 5, 2005. The Billikens led the Tar Heels 34-31 at halftime, but Tyler Hansbrough scored 17 of his 21 points in the second half, including three buckets on the first four possessions of the second half that sparked a 13-0 Carolina run. The Billikens responded with an 11-0 run to retake a 45-44 lead, but David Noel had one of his two assists to Reyshawn Terry to bring the Tar Heels ahead to stay, 46-45. Noel also had 16 points and 11 rebounds, while Reyshawn Terry added 14 points, five rebounds, six assist and a steal. Bobby Frasor had a big game with four points, three rebounds, 12 assists, five steals and just two turnovers.
Then-senior Anthony Drejaj led the Billikens with 16 points (4-of-5 from beyond the arc). Tommie Liddell and Kevin Lisch added 13 points each. Lisch shot 3-of-6 from the three-point line and dished out four assists. Center Ian Vouyoukas struggled, shooting 3-of-8 and fouling out of the game with 2:16 left, but he led the team in rebounds (14), assists (5) and blocks (2).
Radio Coverage: Tar Heel Sports Network coverage begins at 6 p.m. ET.
Injury Report: Quentin Thomas is out for 2-4 weeks with a stress fracture in his foot. Bobby Frasor is doubtful with a hip injury and a sore foot.
Storylines
First road game: Though the Tar Heels have faced teams on a neutral court four times this year, they have yet to play a true road game. Even though many of Tyler Hansbrough's friends and family will be there, make no mistake - the Tar Heels will be in a hostile environment for the first time this year, and the first time ever for many of the freshmen.
"Especially in the ACC, we're going to get to the league, start playing these road games, tough road games, tough environments, things are going to get tougher," Brandan Wright said of the value of this road game experience.
Wright, like the rest of the freshmen, will be making their first long road trip and with Christmas just around the corner, the freshmen will likely be anxious to see their families. Also, almost a year ago to the date (Dec. 21), an inexperienced team then ranked 17th traveled across the country to play against a supposedly lesser opponent and lost to USC, 74-59. The Tar Heels combined for 25 turnovers and shot 25% in the second half. The freshmen combined for 15 of the team's 25 turnovers, and Bobby Frasor and Marcus Ginyard struggled from the field as they shot a combined 4-of-19 while Frasor added seven turnovers. But it wasn't just the freshmen - David Noel led the team in scoring, but turned it over six times. Reyshawn Terry went 0-of-4 from the field. Wes Miller went 1-of-6. Byron Sanders missed all four free-throw attempts.
The combination of the road game experience (only the second of the year for that team) and the proximity to Christmas proved to be lethal. There's no real way Coach Williams can prepare his freshmen for that experience.
"There's no way that I can prepare the freshmen for a true road game. The just have to experience it. I always try to give my teams confidence about playing on the road," Coach Williams said. "Hopefully we'll give them a little confidence talking about it, but you can't simulate it. You can't prepare them for it. They just have to be able to handle it when they get there."
Keeping up the defense: The Tar Heels have played much better defense in the last five games. After allowing an exhibition opponent - Pfeiffer - to score 101 points against the Tar Heels, Coach Williams has been doing his best to stress defense ever since. In the loss to Gonzaga, the Tar Heels allowed the Zags to shoot 52.5% from the field and 57.1% from the three-point line. Regardless of how hot Gonzaga was - and they were hot - that sort of defense is not acceptable on a Roy Williams team. Since that game, the Tar Heels have devoted a noticeable amount of attention to their team defense, and the improvement is evident.
"Guys are moving together more. When you're on the ball, you're supposed to be pressuring. When you're one pass away, you're supposed to be denying. When you're more than one pass away, you're supposed to be helping," Coach Williams said. "I think that's what we did during stretches in the game Saturday and definitely during stretches in the game tonight. Hopefully we'll continue doing that and be able to do that (play good defense) when the other opponent is very similar to us as opposed to somebody who is not as gifted."
The Tar Heels rank seventh in the ACC in field goal percentage defense, allowing their opponents to shoot 41.4%. St. Louis is shooting 45% from the field on the year and averaging 68.3 points a game. Of the eight Billikens that average double-figure minutes, only two shoot below 43.9% from the field. In the last five games, the Tar Heels' field goal percentage defense has been steadily improving, as they allowed 50% to Ohio State, 46.3% to Kentucky, 43.5% to High Point, 33.9% to UNC-Asheville and 35.7% to Florida Atlantic.
"I think it's a lot of things, but the main thing is just five guys in the stance at the same time and moving together as a unit, instead of sometimes watching on film, one or two guys, the guy guarding the ball and maybe one other guy will be in the stance and ready to play," Wes Miller said. "Now all five guys are down and ready, and that makes a difference when you look at the whole scheme of things. We've just got to keep going in that direction, because the best team sin the country are always great defensive teams."
Though St. Louis only shoots 34.8% from the three-point line, Carolina is allowing its opponents to shoot 36% from beyond the arc this season, and St. Louis has capable three-point threats. Kevin Lisch and Tommie Liddell have combined to shoot 32-of-78 (41%) from beyond the arc so far this season. The Tar Heels have not allowed an opponent to shoot better than 27.8% (UNC-Asheville) from the three-point line since the 50% allowed during the Ohio State shootout. That number stands in heavy contrast to the first game games, in which the Tar Heels could only hold Gardner-Webb to under 40% from beyond the arc.
The Billikens also seem to be more of a second-half team, as they have been outscored in the first half 363-365 but have come back in the second half to outscore their opponents, 388-324. Carolina allowed both Kentucky and High Point put up significant field goal percentage increases in the second half, with the Wildcats going from 39.3% from the field to 53.8% in the second half and the Panthers increasing from 37.1% to 50% in the second half. Since then, Carolina has not allowed that to happen since (with the exception of the latter part of the Florida Atlantic game). The Tar Heels seem to have really buckled down on defense and appear capable of playing a complete game.
"In practice, he (Coach Williams) has really stressed it so we've been working hard on defense - denying, making it hard for them to change sides," Ty Lawson said. "That's basically what we did these last two games that helped us, because they weren't able to change sides, they weren't able to do what they wanted to do and run their plays."
At The Game
Listening to the Tar Heel Sports Network at the game: The in-stadium frequency in the Scottrade Center is 92.7 FM, the same frequency that is used for home games.
Watching At Home
Turn down the sound: If you're watching at home while listening to the radio or over the computer via Carolina All-Access, there will inevitably be some delay. For the reason - and a possible solution - click here.
A full list of THSN affiliates can be found here.
ESPNU coverage: The game will be available on ESPNU.
Names To Know
Tyler Hansbrough: Hansbrough is having another steady year for the Tar Heels, leading the team in scoring with 19 points a game. But the reason Hansbrough is someone to watch is that he is returning to his home state of Missouri to face the Billikens. At least 1,000 of the 17,000-population of Poplar Bluff, Missouri will make the roughly 2 ½ hour drive to watch their hometown hero in action. "I've thought about it a great amount, probably before the season even started. It's one of those games I've really been looking forward to. At the same time, they're a good team and we have to focus on them," Hansbrough said. "But me individually, it's going to be a lot of my friends and family are going to be at the game that I've grown up around and I'm really close to, and they haven't gotten to see me play live in college. It's one of those games where I'm going to have to concentrate on the game instead of outside things." If anyone can deal with pressure, it is Tyler Hansbrough. But to play in front of your hometown crowd is an experience that is usually half fun, half stress. "I do feel a little pressure," Hansbrough admitted. "It'd be a disappointment to me personally if I went back home and played badly in front of everybody." Coach Williams isn't worried about the big guy, and was also quick to dismiss any notion that Hansbrough is "struggling" this season because of a few bad games. "I'm dumbfounded at how people are saying, `Well, I'm worried about Tyler.' Tyler's numbers are up, that's what's crazy," Coach Williams said. "There's one number that looks a little bit better that's extremely important and that's 9-1 and 8-2."
Williams said that teams are defending Hansbrough differently this year without David Noel, who played the four position a bit further out on the perimeter. When teams double down on Hansbrough this year, it is usually Brandan Wright's man coming to help, and Wright stays closer to the basket.
Williams admits there are some areas he'd like to see Hansbrough improve in, and one such area is passing out of double- and triple-teams - but only when someone is open. The other area is a quicker release on his shot.
"It's the opposite of Antawn Jamison. Antawn, the ball barely touched his hands before it the shot was taken, and Tyler doesn't have that kind of quick release. He does tend to kind of gather himself a little more so he can explode and jump as high as he can when he shoots the ball.," Coach Williams said. "It's a little unorthodox, and one of the things we're doing is trying to get him to make a quicker move. I think that will help him to be able to do both. He does a marvelous job of keeping his pivot foot down and bouncing around, moving around, but it will help his game and our team so much more if he could make the move quicker."
In the first five games, Hansbrough had no blocks and he has five in the last three. He also leads the team in steals with 15 on the season. His field goal percentage has slightly worsened from 58% in the first five games to 54% in the last five, but that includes a 2-for-12 performance against Kentucky. Another contributing factor is that he getting to the line significantly fewer times. In the first five games, he shot 35-of-50 from the line and in the last five, he has shot 26-of-33. So while he improved his free-throw percentage from 70% in the first five to 79% in the last five (73% on the year), he is not getting to the line the way he was early on. On the season, his average is the same as last season: about six free-throw makes to eight free-throws attempted. But in the first five games, he was averaging about 7-of-10 a game compared to 5-to-7 in the last five.
"I do think that Tyler does get to the free-throw line a great deal. I do think that his style of play, there's going to be more contact," Coach Williams said. "Sometimes, I as his head basketball coach think that he should get to the line even more than he does."
Wes Miller: Wes Miller officially began to wonder what was wrong after an 0-of-5 performance from the three-point line in the Gonzaga loss, but turned in a 3-of-6 shooting performance from beyond the arc in the next three games. However, in the last three games the shooting woes appear to be back, as Miller has made just 1-of-9 three-pointers (11.1%). The three-pointer he made against Florida Atlantic marked the first time he had made a three-pointer for the Tar Heels since the Kentucky game on December 2nd.
"It felt good for me. I haven't been shooting certainly as well as I would have liked thus far this season," Miller said. "The last couple of games I really struggled. I've been shooting a lot in practice, and I've been coming in and getting extra shots up in my spare time. Just to have one go down felt good. I need to see them go down in games.
"I'm going to continue to shoot. That's just what I do."
Miller has a very good shot, and as he and the coaches have said, most of his shots have felt and looked good coming out of his hand. What appears to be worsening the shooting slump is that with Frasor and Thomas out with injury, Miller has been forced to fill the backup point guard role.
"I think it's different when you're playing point guard, there are so many other things you're worrying about so you can't focus that much on shooting. You don't get as many looks, and that's part of it too," Miller said. "Maybe I haven't gotten as many looks playing point, but I've missed open ones and I don't think there's ever any excuse for that."
Despite the shooting troubles, Miller has played very efficiently in the stead of Frasor and Thomas. In the last three games without Frasor, Miller has dished out 12 assists to just four turnovers. In the first five games, Miller only had six assists; he now has 15 in the last five. Frasor will likely not play against St. Louis, so Miller's steady play at the point guard position will be important, and he will need to keep his confidence in his shot until he can go back to his natural position.
Reyshawn Terry: While Carolina has cruised to relatively easy victories and fans have marveled at the play of the freshmen, Reyshawn Terry has quietly improved his game significantly since the beginning of the season. While all season long Terry has been a steady contributor in rebounds (30 in the first five, 34 in the last five) and assists (11 in the first five, 11 in the last five), he has improved in almost every other statistical category. Terry turned the ball over 14 times in the last four games, but has just four in the last five games. Terry's field goal percentage has gone up significantly. In the first five games, he went 14-of-32 (44%) whereas in the last five he shot 21-of-37 (57%). His three-point percentage has risen by over 44 percentage points, as he went 2-of-9 in the first five games (22%) but has gone 12-of-18 from beyond the arc in the last five (66.7%) to put him at 52% on the season.
The only category Terry has digressed in is blocks, swatting away nine shots in the first five games and just four in the last five, but he has cut back significantly on fouls in the process, down from 15 in the first five games to just five fouls in the last five.
Terry appears to have found his shot again, and his senior leadership will be important. He and the rest of the Tar Heels have taken care of the basketball more and made smarter decisions, and one can't help but think the two are related.
Tommie Liddell: The sophomore guard (and former AAU teammate of Tyler Hansbrough) ranks second on the team in scoring with 13.5 points a game and in rebounding with 8.4 points a game. Liddell also leads the Billikens in steals with 1.2 a game. He is averaging the most minutes per game on the team with 35.3 and ranks second on the team in assists with 30 (2.7 a game), but leads the team in turnovers with 43 (3.9 a game).
Ian Vouyoukas: The 6-10 senior is the Billikens' third-leading scorer with 12.5 points a game and leads the team in rebounding with 9.8 a game. He also leads the Billikens in blocks with 2.3 a game. Of the players that have attempted 20 or more shots, his field goal percentage (47.4%) is second-best on the team. However, Vouyoukas is only shooting 55% (38-of-69) from the free-throw line. He is averaging two assists to three turnovers a game.
Kevin Lisch: The sophomore guard leads the Billikens in scoring with 14.9 points a game and assists with 35 (3.2 a game) and just 15 turnovers (1.4 a game). He is also shooting 47-61 from the free-throw line (77%), which ranks second on the team. He also leads the Billikens in three-point percentage (38%) and made three-pointers (19).
Quotables
"He hit a bouncy spot on the floor. The reason he was slowing down, there's a couple of little boards there that have more bounce and a little more spring than the other ones. I was just afraid he was going to try something silly. If he would have missed it, I would have choked him, and then I would have died laughing." -Roy Williams on Ty Lawson's dunk
"As soon as he caught the ball, I knew that he was going to try to dunk, but I really don't expect him to get another one this year." -Brandan Wright on Ty Lawson's dunk
"Charles Barkley, when he was inducted into the Hall of Fame, told his friends or at least a couple of them to stay in Leeds (Leeds, Alabama: Barkley's hometown) because everybody else was going to be gone and the thieves would come in. The thieves will have a great chance in Poplar Bluff on Friday, because they'll all be in St. Louis." -Roy Williams
Lauren Brownlow is the managing editor of Tar Heel Monthly.
