University of North Carolina Athletics
Lucas: The Next 48
January 17, 2011 | Men's Basketball, Featured Writers, Adam Lucas
Jan. 17, 2011
By Adam Lucas
ATLANTA--Detectives say the first 48 hours after a crime has been committed are the most crucial to finding the solution.
Sunday night, Georgia Tech perpetrated "a butt-kicking," as Roy Williams called it, against the Tar Heels. With a game looming Tuesday against Clemson, the response over the next 48 hours--and yes, it's only January--will serve as a signpost for the 2010-11 season.
The next time Carolina plays basketball at Georgia Tech, Alexander Memorial Coliseum will have undergone a $45 million renovation and be known as Hank McCamish Pavilion. According to Yellow Jacket athletic director Dan Radakovich, it will be a makeover so extreme "the only thing that's missing is Ty Pennington and that crew."
You know how sometimes in big construction jobs they post video of the demolition at the beginning of the project? Such a video of the Thrillerdome might set all-time YouTube viewership records in Chapel Hill. Take that, Dennis Scott. Take that, Thaddeus Young. And now, take that Glen Rice Jr. (Yes, those one-night hot streaks have gotten so bad that now the sons of the men who once torpedoed the Tar Heels are having them--Glen Rice Sr. barbecued Carolina in the 1989 NCAA Tournament. Let's agree now that if Harold Arceneaux ever procreates, the Tar Heels do not want that team on the schedule) and Iman Shumpert. Both Shumpert (30 points) and Rice (24 points) tied career highs, meaning those two alone very nearly outscored the Tar Heels during a 78-58 Yellow Jacket win.
If you can believe this, the Thrillerdome will face the wrecking ball with Carolina holding an all-time 12-11 series lead in the facility. I demand a recount, or maybe it's just that some of the defeats feel like they could've counted more than once. Last year, for example, when the Jackets could've named their score before "settling" for a 17-point win. A seven-point loss to an unranked Tech team as the eighth-ranked team in the country in 2007. Six of the last seven times the Tar Heels have faced the Jackets in Atlanta, they've lost.
On a night when the Carolina offense was about as effective as the Atlanta snow removal system, it happened again on Sunday. This time, with a new twist: the 27.6% team field goal percentage was the fourth-lowest in school history and the lowest since 1956. Ready for the kicker? This was against a Tech team that had the highest defensive field goal percentage in the Atlantic Coast Conference (45.2%) entering Sunday's play. The two ACC foes the Jackets had faced (Clemson and Boston College) shot a combined 61.1% from the field.
How to sum that up?
"We stunk," Williams said. "My coaching stunk and we stunk."
Carolina took seven fewer shots than their opponent, primarily because too many possessions were short-circuited by unforced turnovers. The stat sheet shows 18 turnovers for the Tar Heels, a significant figure in a game that wasn't very fast-paced.
How complete was the Tech domination? They controlled the game in both the frontcourt and the backcourt. Points in the paint: Georgia Tech 38, Carolina 22. Fast break points: Georgia Tech 16, Carolina 6.
Even the home crowd, which had plenty of blue, seemed startled by Tech's play. It wasn't until the eight-minute mark of the second half that there was that familiar rumble of a group sensing an upset. A few seconds later, the 6-foot-6 Brian Oliver outfought a couple of Tar Heel big men for an offensive rebound and basket. Shortly after that, Williams obliterated a clipboard during a called timeout, first crunching it into halves and then smashing it into quarters. It felt like a turning point, that moment when Carolina gets it together and creeps back into the game.
It wasn't. Soon Rice was slipping backdoor for an easy basket and then tossing in a three-pointer, followed by a Shumpert dunk. It wasn't the first time that what felt instinctually true--what you knew in your Carolina-blue heart--hadn't worked out. At halftime, down just one after a substandard first-half performance, it felt like the window to come back and power through the second half. "I felt so lucky at half to only be down one," Williams said. That was before substandard turned to record-setting in the second half.
"I could feel them sagging as we got hotter," said Shumpert, who--stop me if you've heard this one--seriously considered Carolina out of high school. "Especially once I started getting into the post. After they got a couple fouls called against them, they realized they had to play me honest and it really opened up for me."
The only good news to report from the evening was John Henson's postgame declaration that after taking a hard fall on his left arm, he felt fine. Leslie McDonald, however, was in some pain because of a back injury--a precarious position considering the Tar Heels play again in less than 48 hours.
Get off the mat, put together a quality outing against the Tigers to move to 3-1 through the first quarter of the league schedule, and maybe Georgia Tech can be dismissed as one of those only-in-Atlanta outings that seem to happen with some regularity.
The fact that a few shots--OK, a bushel of shots--didn't go in at the Thrillerdome doesn't mean the season is doomed any more than the fact that a few late-game clutch plays were made against Virginia Tech meant the Tar Heels were destined to go undefeated in the league. But it does serve as a reminder that this Carolina team, like last year, has very little margin for error. The best Carolina teams figure out a way to win even on the bad nights. You can tell Williams knows this team doesn't have that kind of pure talent, which is why he was so frustrated with his squad's aggressiveness.
"This is the third straight game we walked through the motions," he said. He went on to add some variation of, "I've got to be a better coach," at least four times, which is exactly what you'd expect from a North Carolina head coach. Once, he underlined it with a suitable nod to the importance of the next two days.
"I've got to be a better coach," he said, "really quickly."
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.
