Lucas: UNC Basketball Mailbag

December 16, 2008 | Men's Basketball, Featured Writers, Adam Lucas

By: UNC Athletic Communications

Dec. 16, 2008

Before we get to your questions, I have a question of my own: can anyone explain how in the heck tickets are still available for Thursday night's 7 p.m. tipoff against Evansville? Let's see--top-ranked team in the nation, not a dreaded 9 p.m. start, quality opponent (Evansville is 9-1 and thumped Western Kentucky, a team that beat Louisville). Oh, and there's the little matter of potential genuine Carolina Basketball history, as Tyler Hansbrough is nine points from Phil Ford's UNC career scoring record and Ford will be in the building. If Hansbrough breaks the record, you'll get the chance to see a ceremony and video you won't want to miss--and that you probably will miss if you watch on TV. What, is everybody just mad Evansville no longer wears the t-shirt jerseys, thereby cheating us out of seeing uniform history?

You can buy your tickets here. I realize it's a busy time of year. I realize the tickets that are left aren't on the front row. I realize it's my job to be there (yes, it's actually a real job) and so this is easy for me to say. But you'll thank me in five years: Print out your order confirmation email, wrap it up and give it to someone you want to rehash your once-in-a-generation Tar Heel hoops moment with for the rest of your life.

What preseason tournaments will the Heels participate in in the near future? I have heard that some people want to bring back the Rainbow Classic that usually took place in Hawaii after Christmas. I know that Coach Williams has a fondness for Hawaii and was wondering when we may go back there again?
Will Fitzgerald
Hollidaysburg, PA (formerly from Roxboro, NC)

Coach Williams does indeed have a fondness for Hawaii--more specifically, for Maui--and the Rainbow Classic has already been revived as the Outrigger Rainbow Classic. Right now, however, that's an unlikely destination for the fall of 2009, and it's also in a tricky time slot because it's closer to Christmas than Thanksgiving.

Instead, the best guess is that the Tar Heels will either participate in the Coaches vs. Cancer Classic or the Old Spice Classic in Orlando. The Old Spice field has already been announced, although as you'll notice, they only announced seven teams out of an eight-team field. It's no secret who the event organizers want to be the eighth team. You can pencil the Tar Heels in for the Maui Invitational every four years, as that's the most frequent appearance the NCAA allows. In the other three years, because of the marquee nature of the program, Carolina will be in demand for a host of other events, including the Preseason NIT, Las Vegas Invitational, and the events mentioned above. It's also not hard to imagine Williams having an interest in the 76 Classic in Anaheim to provide another west coast showcase for the Tar Heels. By next season, nearly a third of the scholarship roster (four out of 13) will hail from California. Maui is an exception because of the high-class nature of the field, organization, and destination, but in general Williams has expressed a preference for events that allow participants to play one or two home games as part of the event (like the Las Vegas Invitational last season) before moving on to the final game site.

With Tyler Hansbrough and Wayne Ellington already over the 1,000 career point total and Danny Green and Ty Lawson approaching the scoring milestone as well, has any other Tar Heel team had a foursome with those scoring totals?
Wayne C. Matthews

First, we probably need to make the distinction between active 1,000-point scorers and eventual 1,000-point scorers. Active means the player had surpassed 1,000 points during that season. Eventual means they would eventually score 1,000 points, but may not have reached the milestone during that season.

Only two other Tar Heel teams have ever had four active 1,000-point scorers. The most recent was in 2005, when the eventual national champions included Rashad McCants (15th at 1,721), Jawad Williams (20th at 1,626), Raymond Felton (42nd at 1,260) and Sean May (46th at 1,213). The 2000-01 team also had four active players reach the milestone, as it included Jason Capel (28th at 1,447), Brendan Haywood (30th with 1,411), Kris Lang (31st at 1,392) and Joseph Forte (37th at 1,290).

This year's team will join that group very soon with a quartet of 1,000-point scorers, as Tyler Hansbrough will soon own the UNC career record and Wayne Ellington is climbing the ranks and currently is tied for 46th with 1,213 points. Danny Green will be the next player to join them, as he has 991 career points, and Ty Lawson is just behind at 941.

We'll have to wait for the final career totals on several members of the current team, because several other Carolina teams have boasted more eventual 1,000-point scorers. Surprisingly, the 1989 squad leads that category with seven eventual 1,000-point scorers (Rick Fox, Hubert Davis, Jeff Lebo, J.R. Reid, Scott Williams, Pete Chilcutt and Kevin Madden). The 1984 team had six (Michael Jordan, Kenny Smith, Brad Daugherty, Matt Doherty, Joe Wolf and Sam Perkins) and so did the 1998 team (Vince Carter, Antawn Jamison, Brendan Haywood, Ed Cota, Ademola Okulaja and Shammond Williams).

It's worth noting that in the current sports environment, it's hard to put as much value in cumulative stats. Brandan Wright and Marvin Williams would certainly have been 1,000-point scorers if they played in a different era. You could make the argument that per-game averages might be more important in the future.

It is clearly debatable whether this year's starting five is the best in Tar Heel history. They are, no doubt among the best, but the 1982-3, 1992-3 and 2004-5 starting fives were all outstanding as well. But, is there really any doubt that this year's top 10 players are the best top 10 ever for Carolina?
Peter Bird
Durham, NC

Is there any doubt? Yes. First, we'd have to figure out which players make up this year's top 10. Do you include Tyler Zeller? And if so, how do you evaluate what he would contribute? Two games isn't much of a sample size. I think you have to treat Zeller as a redshirt until proven otherwise, which means the top 10 would consist of Tyler Hansbrough, Danny Green, Ty Lawson, Wayne Ellington, Marcus Ginyard, Deon Thompson, Ed Davis, Larry Drew II, Bobby Frasor and Will Graves. That's an impressive top 10. But is it better than the 1984 team, which featured Michael Jordan, Brad Daugherty, Matt Doherty, Steve Hale, Sam Perkins, Buzz Peterson, Dave Popson, Kenny Smith and Joe Wolf as the top nine? What about 1987, with a nine of Steve Bucknall, Curtis Hunter, Jeff Lebo, Dave Popson, J.R. Reid, Kenny Smith, Ranzino Smith, Scott Williams and Joe Wolf? In 1994, the Tar Heel top ten included Dante Calabria, Jeff McInnis, Eric Montross, Derrick Phelps, Brian Reese, Kevin Salvadori, Jerry Stackhouse, Rasheed Wallace, Donald Williams and Serge Zwikker.

Your preference probably depends on your age. What's notable, though, is that the 1984, '87, and '94 teams all suffered surprising postseason disappointments, which highlights how difficult it is to manage a large amount of talented depth--especially in the college game, where one hot night from an opposing standout can end the season of a superior team.

By the way, nobody asked, but if you're making a list of the best Carolina starting fives of all time, you have to include 1957, 1977, 1982, 1984, 1993, 1998 and 2005. And this group can't begin to enter that conversation until April.

Brownlow's Down Low
I've been thinking about this since the Notre Dame game. Here we are sitting atop everything and nobody outside of the club is saying otherwise. And why would they after we play a couple of the better teams in the nation and completely dismantle them (and we are not at full strength yet). It got me thinking, what is the best margin of victory the Tar Heels have had against ranked opponents over the course of a year and how does this year's team compare so far? It will be interesting to see how that number does the rest of the season.
Collins Wetzel
Fredericksburg, VA

Lauren writes:

Carolina has beaten two top-25 teams, both of which are likely to end up there. But they have beaten both teams by a combined 50 points, or an average margin of +25.0 points. If that holds up - which it almost assuredly won't - it would be the highest scoring margin over ranked teams since 1997-98, when that team went 12-2 against ranked opponents and had an average margin of +14.1 points. Interestingly enough, the team with the biggest margin of victory over ranked opponents in the Roy Williams era was the 2006-07 team, a group that went 7-1 against ranked teams with the only loss coming to Georgetown. That team had an average margin of +11.4.

Of Carolina's four national championship teams, none had a double-digit advantage over top-25 opponents. The 1957 team was 7-0 against ranked opponents and won by an average of +6.1 points. The 1982 team was 9-1 against ranked teams and held a margin of +7.1 points. The 1993 team was 12-2 against ranked opponents and outscored those teams by an average of 8.6 points. The 2005 team was 9-2 and held a margin of +8.4 points.

Of Carolina's Final Four teams, quite a few had narrow margins of victory over ranked opponents. The 1968 and 1969 teams each had a combined margin of just +0.3 points in those games, going a combined 11-5 in those two seasons. Only two Final Four teams ever ended the year with a double-digit margin over ranked teams: the 1998 team and the 1972 Final Four squad that went 7-2 and outscored ranked teams by 10.3 points. Only the 2000 team ever went to the Final Four and had a negative margin against ranked squads, going 5-7 against such teams with a margin of -0.2 points. Last year's Final Four team had the smallest margin since that season, going 4-2 against ranked squads and outscoring them by just 2.0 points.

Carolina would become just the sixth team to ever have a double-digit scoring margin over ranked opponents in Carolina history. Of those, just two made the Final Four (1972 and 1998), none won the title and all were considered some of the most talented teams in Carolina history. The 1984 team (+13.8) was plagued by injuries; both the 1994 (+11.7) and 2007 (+11.4) squads never quite clicked.

Adam Lucas is the publisher of Tar Heel Monthly. He is also the author or co-author of four books on Carolina basketball.