University of North Carolina Athletics
Lucas: Post Pieces
November 23, 2010 | Men's Basketball, Featured Writers, Adam Lucas
Nov. 23, 2010
By Adam Lucas
Since his team's return from Puerto Rico, Roy Williams has consistently preached one central theme: do your job.
It's as much about not trying to do too much as it is about taking care of an individual's specific responsibilities. Around the perimeter and on the wing, the Tar Heels are still trying to figure out exactly who is responsible for what. Williams said he wants to give Reggie Bullock, who didn't play in the 80-69 win over UNC-Asheville, more minutes. Larry Drew II and Kendall Marshall are still figuring out how to share the point guard position, and Williams has taken to subbing them offense (Marshall)/defense (Drew) in the last two games. Harrison Barnes, to the consternation of some, still is working to find that point when, as Williams says, he loses himself in the game.
In the post, however, the Tar Heels seem to be on a much faster path to defining their individual roles. Offensively, it starts with Tyler Zeller, who has now made 15 of his last 24 shots and scored a career-high 23 points against the Bulldogs. His teammates seem to understand that Zeller is evolving into the player they've always said he was in practice and the summer.
Carolina led 68-57 with 6:30 left after a Bulldog timeout. The Tar Heel play was simple--get the ball to Zeller, who posted and scored. At this point in the season, he's the guy and everyone recognizes it. That's progress.
His starting partner in the frontcourt is John Henson, who was the most recent Next Big Thing before Barnes arrived. The Tampa product's line of 10 points, 11 rebounds, and five blocks is the kind of stat-stuffing he's done regularly lately; before his Carolina career is over, he'll notch at least one triple-double.
But it wasn't the stats that were the most encouraging part of his night. Instead, consider the fact that he walked out of the locker room juggling a DVD of the game along with his postgame meal.
"I like to get game film after every game so I can see what I can do better," says Henson, who credits video coordinator Eric Hoots with badgering him into appreciating the value of film. "I started doing it towards the end of last year. It gives me some things to put in the back of my mind, like if I'm open somewhere or I can set a screen somewhere."
He wants to get better. And more than just wanting it, he's acting on it, a mature step. There's no way to know if he'll pick up anything valuable from watching the game again by himself. But it's a certainty that if he doesn't watch it, he won't pick up anything.
By the time you get past Henson and Zeller, you've already called two-thirds of the post battalion. But it's that third player, Justin Knox, who seems to make everything fit. Williams wants his team to know their roles? The grad student has his down cold: "My job is to play defense," he says. Then he corrects himself. "My job is to play great defense. Run hard on transition. Post hard and make finishing shots. Be a good all-around player, and talk on defense."
Yes, that's pretty much it. Who would have guessed that the player with the least Carolina background might be the quickest to adapt to what's expected of being a Tar Heel? He's a bruiser--you can see that. Midway through the second half, he stepped out near midcourt, stepped around a screen, and landed in front of Bulldog guard J.P. Primm. The two collided. Primm went down in a heap. Knox, who was called for the foul, barely moved. It looked like an aircraft carrier colliding with a guppy.
He doesn't play dirty, but he plays with a welcome edge. Through the first two weeks of the season, when Carolina is on the verge of being pushed around, it's often Knox who puts an end to it. With 1:38 left in a game that was close to over, he dove into the baseline seats to save an errant Drew pass. Ask yourself this: have you ever, in his 82 career minutes, looked out on the floor and thought he could be working any harder? He plays like a player who knows he only has one year left, and who is trying to cram four years of loving college basketball into six months.
"I love it here," he says. "I just feel like I'm in the right place now. Last year I was frustrated throughout the season. We lost two games, but I'm not frustrated here. I'm excited for the rest of the season."
There's reason to share that excitement. Already, the pieces fit in the post, with all three players possessing at least a basic understanding of their roles. It's more crowded on the perimeter, but there's the potential there for the same synergy. The head coach sees it. "If I live through this team, we're going to be a heck of a lot better at the end of the year," he said.
Why? What could he possibly see in a 19-turnover, 46-percent shooting performance? Maybe he sees scenes like this one:
A little after 10 p.m., a handful of Tar Heels--Henson among them--walked out of the Smith Center into an unseasonably warm evening. They'd just finished one of the most unique stretches of the 2010-11 schedule, shoehorning a pair of nearly four-hour flights, four games, and multiple practices and meetings into just six days. Staring them in the face was a Thanksgiving Day practice and the likelihood of two practices on Friday.
Wednesday, mercifully, was scheduled to be an off day. They're 19- and 20-year-olds but they're not invincible. With no classes and no practice, it seemed like a day that was likely to be filled with sleeping in and a few video games.
"Hey, you going to be down here tomorrow?" Henson asked his teammates, gesturing at the Smith Center.
The response came in the affirmative from all involved.
"All right," Henson said. "See you here."
Adam Lucas is the publisher of Tar Heel Monthly. He is also the author or co-author of six books on Carolina basketball, including the official chronicle of the first 100 years of Tar Heel hoops, A Century of Excellence, which is available now. Get real-time UNC sports updates from the THM staff on Twitter.
