University of North Carolina Athletics
Lucas: UNC Basketball Mailbag
February 8, 2011 | Men's Basketball, Featured Writers, Adam Lucas
Feb. 8, 2011
By Adam Lucas
It seems like the topic of Harrison Barnes has cooled down since the beginning of the season. It seems like throughout the season he has had better 1st halves than 2nd halves in games. Do you think this is due to opponents shifting their guard assignments, him playing less minutes, or just random luck?
Bernardo Mainou `07
This is one of the weirdest stats of the Tar Heel season. Because Bernardo is correct--it doesn't just "seem" like Barnes was having more first-half success earlier in the year. The stats actually bear it out. In the first half of Tar Heel games this year, Barnes is shooting 47.3% from the field (62-131). In the second half, his field goal percentage is 33.9% (42-124). Some of those numbers are a holdover from the first month of the season, when the freshman endured an eight game stretch where he made just two second-half field goals.
But Barnes has been one of Carolina's most consistent players over the last five games, and his half-by-half statistics have also normalized during that time period. In those games, he's shooting 17-for-31 in the first half, and 17-for-35 in the second half. Including in those second-half stats, of course, are several huge late jumpers.
It's worth noting that Barnes was perhaps the most demonstrably adamant about the value of playing in tandem with Kendall Marshall. It's probably not a coincidence that as Marshall's minutes have increased, so has Barnes's production.
As a huge Tar Heel fanatic who lives out of state (Rochester, NY) I would be truly grateful if you are able to help me out with 2 questions.
* Is there any site or avenue to pursue to track down previous seasons Tar Heel games? Believe it or not I want to watch the '08 Final Four game against Kansas and other games (regular season & tournament) from over the years. Does UNC make them available or do you know anywhere else I can get my hands on some without having to pay $25 per dvd per game for the few that are available?
*Also, most games are not telecast here in Rochester. Are there any websites that show the game- live or delayed/replayed? We dont get the ACC Network, Raycom or Fox Sports Net so of the 10 remaining games only 4 will be televised in my area.
Dave Kress
Rochester, NY
First of all, Dave, I don't believe even for a second that you want to re-watch the 2008 Final Four game against Kansas. I was at that game and didn't even want to watch it in person, much less watch it again when I got home. In fact, I had my wife delete it from the DVR before I could even see it listed on there so that it didn't sear my pupils.
There are two sites you need to bookmark. After you do that, you need to let your place of employment know that you'll be taking the rest of the week off. The first is the ACC Vault. This is a ridiculous site, in the sense that "ridiculous" means "this is one of the world's great inventions." You can sort through 30 years of ACC games by team, by highlight, or by player. It actually took me an extra hour to write this Mailbag because I got distracted by the 1989 Carolina-Duke ACC Tournament final, perhaps the most intense game in the history of the rivalry.
I also watched part of the 1985 Carolina-UCLA game, which is erroneously listed as being played at the Smith Center in the game description. This was supposed to be the opening game of the Smith Center, but the facility wasn't ready in time. I was at this game and was blown away when Bruins coach Walt Hazzard received a technical foul. Having been raised on Dean Smith, I couldn't imagine what a coach would have to do to get a technical foul. Unfortunately, in Indianapolis in 1991, I learned all it takes is asking, "How much time do I have?"
You know how sometimes you run across something on the internet and a friend says, "You could spend hours doing this?" But actually you spend about 15 minutes and then you're done with it. That's not the case with the ACC Vault. You very easily could spend hours going through all the classic games. The fact that it's free blows my mind. Another crazy thing you'll realize when you watch some of the older games: for almost 50 years, we watched college basketball on television and no one ever had the idea to put the score on the screen at all times. Even in 2003, that wasn't standard. From now on, let's just agree that Roy Williams invented that when he returned to Carolina. It'll drive the State fans crazy.
When you think you're finished, you're actually just starting. Check out the NCAA Vault for a similar setup that covers NCAA Tournament games. Dave, they've even got your 2008 Carolina-Kansas game, although with choices like 2000 UNC-Tennessee or 2005 UNC-Villanova, I can't imagine reliving 40-12 would be near the top of your list.
As for streaming live games, ESPN3.com is probably your best bet, assuming you're not willing to relocate from Rochester.
As fun as it was to watch the Heels play really well in Boston Tuesday night, I couldn't help but notice we don't seem to "thank the passer" the way Coach Smith taught. Is that something the current coaches still ask of the players? Perhaps they do it more than we can see on TV? Just curious, it's something I have always thought was really classy.
Bryan Pennington
First, I definitely think the Tar Heels do it more often than it's caught on TV. Tyler Zeller, in particular, can regularly be spotted thanking the passer. At the games, you'll also see the players on the bench and the coaching staff pointing to the passer quite a bit.
But it's also true that the Tar Heels don't do it every single time. This has come up from time to time in the Williams era, and he's addressed it occasionally on his radio show. His basic response is this: he values thanking the passer, but he also values getting back on defense. And if a player's reason for failing to get back is that he was thanking the passer, that's not going to work.
Brownlow's Down Low
One of my favorite teams was the 96-97 team (which I think is woefully underrated). That year, if memory serves, the team struggled through the beginning of the ACC schedule before Dean Smith inserted a smooth-passing freshman point guard in the starting line-up to give the team a boost (Ed Cota). The team went on to have a perfect February and make the Final Four. Obviously, there are differences, but I would love to know how closely these teams match up.
Milo Travis
UNC '00
Lauren writes:
The biggest similarity to me is how the teams improved throughout the year and how much both Coach Smith and Coach Williams had to tweak to adjust to their personnel. But people forget that the `97 team not only started out 0-3 in the ACC but also ended up 3-5 after an 80-73 loss at Duke on January 29th. The Tar Heels won 16 straight after that and did not lose again until the Final Four. The '97 team lost just one non-conference game - to Arizona, the same team that ended their season. This year's team struggled with a tough non-conference slate before figuring things out by ACC time.The '97 team had almost no bench; the most minutes anyone averages this year is 27.1 (Harrison Barnes) while the fewest anyone in the main rotation averaged in 1997 was 27.6 (sophomore Vince Carter). Four different Tar Heels averaged over 30 minutes in '97 (sophomore Antawn Jamison, junior Shammond Williams, sophomore Ademola Okulaja and senior Serge Zwikker).
While Ed Cota started some games early (7 all year), he still came off the bench for the most part. Shammond Williams started most games; he had 153 assists and 94 turnovers. Cota still played averaged just over 28 minutes and played 30 or more minutes in seven of the final 10 games and averaged 7.6 assists in that span (he averaged 6.9 his entire freshman year; Marshall is averaging 5.0). Cota also turned it over quite a bit more than Marshall (he averaged 3.6 his freshman year and Marshall is averaging 1.9). But the offense certainly started running much more efficiently as the team gained more experience in '97, similar to this year.
An interesting tidbit from THB.com's profile of Cota under the headline 1996-97 Regular Season: "Turning point of his season came late in the second half of the loss at Duke (Jan. 29) - Calmly sank a 15-foot jumper with 1:30 to play to cut Duke's lead to two points." Cota, then a freshman, went on to win three straight ACC Rookie of the Week awards in February and was named to the All-ACC Tournament second team. He led the ACC and was eighth in the country in assists. Maybe that means a big game at Duke is on the horizon for Marshall.
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.
