University of North Carolina Athletics
Brownlow: Almost Doesn't Count
January 8, 2012 | Women's Basketball
Jan. 8, 2012
Even Sylvia Hatchell didn't know what to expect from her team after they finished the pre-Christmas schedule with a blowout loss to South Carolina and a narrow win over ECU. Carolina finished the ECU game with six healthy players and stood at 8-2 on the season.
This team looks nothing like that one. But it also looks nothing like some of the veteran-laden squads Carolina has had the last few years. In the previous two seasons, Carolina was 5-6 in ACC games decided by fewer than ten points and just two of those losses came to ranked teams (and just one win).
Entering Sunday, Carolina was 2-0 in such games, including a win over No. 12 Miami and a double-overtime win at Virginia, a game a much more experienced squad lost two years ago. So what's changed between the ECU game and now?
"Winning, it is a mentality," Hatchell said. "I've asked Chay (Shegog) and Krista Gross and some of those kids to really step up and set the tone, and they have. They're doing about as much as they can do, really. ... These kids are fighting hard and that's all I can ask them to do."
Shegog and Laura Broomfield (both seniors) and Gross (a junior) have been doing all they can to win games. Shegog has averaged 21 points on 52% shooting in 42 minutes a game in the last three games, despite being the focus of opposing defenses. Gross has averaged 34 minutes and has played every position from forward to point guard. Broomfield scratched her cornea and had a cut under her eye that caused it to swell shut. But she insisted Hatchell should put her back in (obviously, she didn't).
"This is the kind of mentality these kids have: (Broomfield) said, `I'm ready to go. I can play.' I went down there and looked at it and .... it was swollen shut. I was like, `How's she going to play? She can't even see!' But she said, `I'm ready to go. I can play.' That's the mentality. That's good. That's why they're going to keep getting better," Hatchell said.
After Shannon Smith had a breathing problem and Broomfield hurt her eye, she was down to five fully healthy players, eight in uniform.
Tierra Ruffin-Pratt, playing in just her second game this season, was tired late in the second half. Hatchell looked down the bench for a sub. There was no one else. "I looked (down the bench) and I didn't have anybody to sub. Tierra Ruffin-Pratt needed to come out and I didn't have anybody to put in for her, so I had to move one of the post (players) to the wing to let her come out for a minute," Hatchell said.
This is late in a hotly-contested battle against an undefeated ACC rival. And Hatchell doesn't have anyone to substitute for a tired player. And yet Carolina was right there until the very end.
Despite a gut-punching Maryland lay-up at the buzzer in regulation to tie it, Carolina took a 70-69 lead halfway through overtime. But when Gross fouled out with 2:21 left, it was too much to overcome. Maryland outscored the Tar Heels 9-2 the rest of the way.
Hatchell isn't one to make excuses, and she doesn't acknowledge moral victories - her team is coming in tomorrow for a 6:00 AM practice because, as she put it, "We don't accept losing." She sees her team, no matter how many players were out, as just a few missed opportunities away from pulling off its third win in six days and knocking off yet another ranked team.
But Hatchell also knows that once her injured players get back and everyone gets used to playing together again, the Tar Heels could be - and likely will be - really good. And all the adversity they have been through will make them even better.
"We've had to battle....but these kids are tough and this is what they're used to. They're forming a mentality that will take them a long way," Hatchell said. "They're all having to give and to dig, but we're going to keep fighting and I think good things are going to start happening for us."
