University of North Carolina Athletics
Brownlow: Latta Watches Familiar Growing Pains
January 6, 2008 | Women's Basketball
Jan. 6, 2008
By Lauren Brownlow
Ivory Latta was back in Chapel Hill on Saturday afternoon, if briefly. It was strange to see the autograph seekers line up to meet her after the game and remember what a transcendental presence that she was - not only in Carolina basketball history, but in women's basketball as well.
But this year's team has been nothing if not understated. Cetera DeGraffenreid, this season's starting point guard, is quick like Latta and has her intensity and the fire in her eyes. But you rarely see her dancing, or jumping up and down, or doing much of anything besides narrowing her eyes intently, focused on the task at hand, slowly rocking back and forth pre-tipoff.
Italee Lucas has a quiet confidence, one that is evident when you see her on the court attempting a no-look, behind-the-back pass that you just know she wouldn't try it if hadn't worked before. Or when she is able to use that quick crossover dribble to leave a befuddled defender in her dust, even if she doesn't always know when to pass, how far to penetrate, and when to shoot it.
You can see how much potential either - or both - of the freshmen guards have to become every bit as talented and dominant as Latta was in her prime.
But in Saturday's win, the freshmen had a bad day. Lucas had one assist and three turnovers in the first half compared to no assists and four turnovers in eight second-half minutes. DeGraffenreid had a nice first half with two assists and two turnovers. But in the second half, she missed all three of her shot attempts and had four assists to four turnovers.
"I just love them because they're all like little spiders out there everywhere, and that's what I want them to be. I just told them, I said, `Go, go, go.' I really liked it in the first half when we had both Italee and Cetera both out there because I thought we were really being aggressive and attacking when they were both out there. Now, Italee would dribble over to the side and go into the trap and I had to take her out and talk to her about that a little bit," Hatchell said. "We lived through that with Ivory when she was a freshman. We lived through the same mistakes. They will get a lot better as they move along, I usually let them make a few mistakes but then if they don't listen and they keep making the same mistakes then I really get upset with them. But I love them. They're going to be great players for us."
It's hard to remember that Latta was once a freshman, too. It's a strange thought. It's also hard to remember that Latta once struggled and didn't put up the kinds of numbers Carolina fans were used to seeing out of her. In fact, as a freshman, she watched Duke celebrate after winning the ACC title and famously promised her coach that Carolina would never again lose in the ACC Tournament while she was there. And they never did. Latta is the only player in ACC history, male or female, to win the ACC Tournament MVP three years in a row.
As a freshman, Latta had 110 assists and 96 turnovers in 31 games, or 3.5 assists to 3.1 turnovers. This season, DeGraffenreid is averaging 3.7 assists to 2.7 turnovers (55 assists to 40 turnovers) and Italee Lucas has 49 assists to 65 turnovers, or 3.3 assists and 4.3 turnovers.
It's not often that Carolina sees teams that are willing to apply full-court defensive pressure. In the first half, Carolina responded well and broke the press with ease, making good decisions and finding open teammates with long passes, moving the ball faster down the court than the Yellow Jackets could keep up with. But in the second half, the whole team - not just the freshmen guards - simply could not break the Georgia Tech press.
"I thought the first half we did a real good job breaking it. I thought we were breaking it and getting some good looks. We were being real aggressive. Second half, we started making some poor decisions. We started trying to dribble through some traps and our short guards were trying to make lob passes instead of faking them and stepping through like we teach them, stuff like that. But Georgia Tech is very athletic and that is what they do well. Italee and Cetera both are very good ball-handlers and they're going to give a lot of people fits with their presses and their defenses," Hatchell said.
And so Carolina honored Latta and what she did on Saturday. But the day felt like closure, a definitive end to the Latta era at North Carolina. Latta spent last season on the bench with the Detroit Shock and is now playing in Israel. But she still follows her Tar Heels, staying up until 5:00 in the morning Israeli time while her mother held the telephone up to the television speaker during the Tennessee game.
"I miss it a lot. I came in the locker room the other day and I was like, `Oh, that's not my locker anymore, but that's all right.' So I really do miss going out there and playing with my team. But at the same time, she (Coach Hatchell) has a great team this year and I'm looking forward to them doing great things," Latta said.
Lauren Brownlow is the managing editor of Tar Heel Monthly.
