University of North Carolina Athletics
Lucas: The Missing Piece
February 10, 2006 | Women's Basketball
Feb. 9, 2006
By Adam Lucas
Thursday night, Alex Miller proved everything close observers of the Carolina women's basketball team have known for weeks.
Unfortunately, it took her absence to prove it.
It's OK if you don't recognize her name. She's not Ivory Latta or Erlana Larkins or even Camille Little, so she's not in the headlines for the nation's top-ranked women's basketball team.
Matter of fact, she's not even in the starting lineup. But Miller has quietly been lightning off the bench for the Tar Heels. At many programs, she would have been pigeonholed--at 5-foot-6--as the backup point guard.
Not at Carolina. Sylvia Hatchell decided to use Miller and Latta (who rarely leaves the game, so there's no need for a backup) in tandem. The duo gives Carolina a quick-on-quick backcourt that presents all sorts of matchup problems and jump-starts the Tar Heel fast-break attack. Most teams don't have any guards as quick as one of the duo, much less two. At 5-foot-6 apiece, they should be easy to post up, but they're so ferocious defensively that most teams haven't had much success pinning them in the paint.
Carolina's game is built on a foundation of speed and athleticism. Miller provides an extra dose that most opponents simply can't match.
When Latta was saddled with three fouls with 7 minutes remaining in the first half of Thursday's extremely physical game--the contest was not televised, presumably because WWE RAW's regular timeslot is on Monday, not Thursday--it was Miller who took over and ran the show. When Latta left the game, the Tar Heel lead was just 3 points. But behind Miller's 8 first-half points, the Heels stretched the advantage to 10 at halftime.
The Tar Heels survived with just half their guard duo for the first half. They couldn't do the same in the second half.
Miller went down in a scary collision around the 13:30 mark of the second half. She lay sprawled on the floor beyond the baseline for almost 45 seconds before the game was stopped; eventually, she was removed with her head immobilized on a stretcher. The Durham native was taken to the hospital. All x-rays were negative and she left the emergency room late Thursday evening.
Some of her teammates watched the on-court proceedings with moist eyes--Latta pulled her jersey over her head.
"At first, that fired us up, because (our players) were really upset," Sylvia Hatchell said. "Especially Erlana. But it may have drained us a little bit. They were visibly shaken out on the court."
Larkins might have been shaken, but it didn't show immediately. In the next 45 seconds she drew a foul, made a free throw, forced a turnover, scored again, and then sprinted past Crystal Langhorne to make it 5 straight points and a 70-56 Carolina lead.
What no one realized was that every step down the court was sapping another ounce of energy from the star sophomore, who has periodically had cramping problems during her stellar career.
They became a problem again after Ashleigh Newman hit a desperation 3-pointer to force overtime. As that shot was dropping through the net, Larkins went down with painful cramps (she was hospitalized for the same condition after a road game at FSU last season and also had to be helped off the court in last year's NCAA second-round win over George Washington). She became the fourth Tar Heel to suffer a game-stopping injury--Miller, La'Tangela Atkinson's knee injury (she returned), and Latta getting popped in the nose were the others--and would not return.
That left the Heels without two of their top 6 in terms of minutes per game for the overtime.
A furious rally, capped by a Latta 3-pointer at the buzzer that evidently drew no contact and never made it to the rim, fell 3 points short, due largely to poor free throw shooting and some epic Terrapin shots.
"It was a hard game," Hatchell said. "In many ways."
The hard part now is reconstructing her team. Larkins should return, Latta is indestructible, and Atkinson played well after reentering the game.
But Miller's health will remain a concern. Without her, the defensive guard pressure on Latta increases. Without her, Carolina's dribble penetration decreases. And without her, the rotation simply isn't as fluid.
Coaches constantly discuss what their team can learn from losses. Thursday's lesson was clear: everyone, even the most casual fan, suddenly understands how fragile a championship season--and rotation--can be.
Adam Lucas is the publisher of Tar Heel Monthly and can be reached at alucas@tarheelmonthly.com. He is the coauthor of the official book of the 2005 championship season, Led By Their Dreams, and his book on Roy Williams's first season at Carolina, Going Home Again, is now available in bookstores. To subscribe to Tar Heel Monthly or learn more about Going Home Again, click here.
