University of North Carolina Athletics
Friday Practice Notes
August 18, 2006 | Football
Aug. 18, 2006
By Adam Lucas
Most fans are familiar with the concept of a two-minute offense. But they might not know as much about a four-minute offense, which Carolina worked on during Friday's practice. It's basically the opposite of a two-minute drill--the Tar Heels have the ball and the lead with four minutes left and need to melt some clock...Friday afternoon marks the beginning of a long-awaited weekend off. It's important for some mental refreshment, but also for some physical recovery. Several Tar Heels are nursing nagging injuries that held them out Friday, including Scott Lenahan, Durell Mapp, and Shelton Bynum...Lenahan's injury forced some juggling along the offensive line. Several players, including Ben Lemming and Calvin Darity, were tried at the center position...
How important are details during training camp? During a punt drill, Andre Powell made the punt team start over for a failure to properly break the huddle...There was a nice moment at the end of a team situational period when Tavares Brown tipped a pass and then sprawled for an interception. On the first day of practice, freshmen have their names written on a strip of tape that is placed on their helmet. After Brown bounced off the ground with the ball, John Bunting, Ken Browning, and Marvin Sanders met him on the sideline and Bunting ripped the strip of tape off Brown's helmet. "I know who you are, Tavares Brown!" he boomed. "You don't need this tape."...
Kendric Burney is listed at 5-foot-9 and that might be optimistic. But he more than makes up for the lack of height with a tremendous vertical jump. He showed it again Friday, as a Carolina quarterback thought he could loft a ball over Burney's head, but the freshman soared to break up the pass...After reviewing tape of yesterday's scrimmage, Bunting had these comments: "It's never as bad as you think it is and never as good as you think it is. What we saw on tape was that the thing that made the scrimmage irritating was the exchange, because we had a couple of balls on the ground. There were plays where we were that close to making a big play. And we also made a couple of big plays. That tape from yesterday and the response we had on the practice field today is indicative of where we're going with this training camp."...
If your usual reading includes the sports page but not much else, check out today's Wall Street Journal. The full story isn't available online, but through a fairly scientific process, they named Carolina one of the top 10 schools in the country for players who want to play in the NFL...No practice notes the next two days--because there won't be a practice. The next session is scheduled for Monday afternoon and notes will be up that evening. Also, look for John Bunting's annual media blitz next Wednesday, and don't forget that his first radio show at Lucy's is Thursday the 24th, with the first Bunting television show following that same weekend (August 26 and 27).
As usual, a reader question to end the notes:
What is the deal with Terry Hunter?
This may make it into the all-time football email Q&A Hall of Fame. Maybe Hunter can be enshrined while wearing a white floppy hat so we can have two inductions at once.
Bunting's comments from Friday about Hunter:
"Terry was enrolled in summer school. He apparently did quite well. But he's not enrolled in school right now and he is not a member of this team. If he gets enrolled in school, I will talk with him again and if we are all in agreement, we can have him back on the football team as a non-scholarship player. He wouldn't be eligible to play, but he could be on the team this year in terms of practicing if we come to an agreement on his behavior. There's no doubt in my mind this program could help him and I know he feels the same way. I know he misses it."
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.
