University of North Carolina Athletics
Brownlow: Tar Heels Get Early Test
November 7, 2007 | Women's Basketball
Nov. 7, 2007
By Lauren Brownlow
Despite an attendance of 2,437, Carmichael Auditorium erupted the moment LaToya Pringle tipped in a missed Erlana Larkins free throw with eight seconds left to give Carolina a 70-68 win over China National. Carolina practices the free-throw miss all the time, and with the Tar Heels tied at 68 with the Chinese National Team and both fan contingencies going crazy, the practice paid off.
But savvy senior LaToya Pringle saw that the intelligent players on the China National team were onto her. "Actually I didn't run the play. They were kind of catching onto it, so I faked to go inside and I went outside. I actually thought we were up by one when she made the free throw, so I was just all caught up in the moment. So I thought we were up by three when I put it in, but when I got to the locker room I found out that that was the one that won it," Pringle said.
It was certainly unlike almost any exhibition game in recent memory for Coach Sylvia Hatchell. If anything, it was evocative of an ACC game against a gritty, lower-tier team that simply doesn't quit. But the China National Team is certainly neither lower tier nor did it treat this game like an exhibition game. Carmichael Auditorium held quite a few supporters of the opposition there, chanting "CHI!" "NA!" in the same sing-song way Carolina fans chant "Tar! Heels!"
This has been a busy month for the China National team, which beat New Mexico on November 1st in an exhibition, traveled to Texas A&M and took the No. 11 Aggies down to the wire, eventually falling 76-70. They took their show on the road and came to Chapel Hill, a well-oiled machine that seemed to have too much for this young team.
But Carolina has a few veterans of its own.
Erlana Larkins was able to create 13 points for herself and 13 points for her teammates on six assists. China's defense collapsed inside on Larkins and LaToya Pringle, but Larkins is a terrific passer and when the huge bodies on the China National Team (almost all of whom are six feet tall or taller) converged on her, she was able to dish to an open teammate.
Rashanda McCants has talked about taking a leadership role this season, and she seems to have done that. As Carolina was down 68-63 with a little less than two minutes to go, McCants called for the ball and shot a three-pointer that rimmed out. Though she missed what would have been a huge shot, McCants spent the rest of the game giving Carolina spurts of offense whenever it needed it, including nine points in a little less than three minutes in the first half.
Coach Hatchell made it clear to her team after the game that she was going to give the freshmen like Cetera DeGraffenreid, Italee Lucas and Rebecca Gray a much longer leash than she will her veterans. Her primary area of concern was her team's defense as Carolina gave up 21 points off turnovers to China and allowed them to shoot 53.3% in the second half as opposed to 36.7% in the first half. Coach Hatchell and her staff will have a separate film session for the freshmen to critique their performances.
"I told them in the locker room that I'm leaving the freshmen out there and I'm tolerating more mistakes with them because they're freshmen. The other ones, no, they can't be making that many mistakes but I'm letting the freshmen make more mistakes in these games to get them experience and so they can learn," Coach Hatchell said. "Like trailing the shooters coming off screens - a team like this, you don't make an Olympic team unless you can shoot the ball. You've got to trail shooters and our freshmen were not trailing them. They got probably three wide-open three-point shots that they made because our freshmen weren't trailing the shooters. "
This is a team in Carolina that, although it has quite a few new additions, is used to winning - often. Certainly, it is not a team used to feeling the heat in an exhibition game. But perhaps past Carolina teams would not have gained as much out of playing a team like China as this team mixed solidly with young and old did. In a team full of veterans used to being deferential, it is now time for those veterans to step up and take on the load. They proved at the very least that it's a challenge they are willing to take seriously.
"Even though we weren't playing well and we'd made a lot of mistakes, they dug deep when they had to and did some things to win a game. They showed that they were warriors and that they were competitors, and that's what I want," Coach Hatchell said. "It doesn't really count, but we don't want to lose. We don't want to lose at any time in any game, and that's the mentality you've got to have. This team, to win a championship - and that has been our mentality the past few years - you've just got to say, `Hey, we don't lose,' and you do whatever it takes."
Lauren Brownlow is the managing editor of Tar Heel Monthly.
