University of North Carolina Athletics
Lucas: UNC Basketball Notebook
September 3, 2016 | Men's Basketball, Featured Writers, Adam Lucas
By Adam Lucas
As noted in this week's column on Joel Berry II and Raymond Felton, a variety of Carolina basketball alumni have been back in Chapel Hill regularly this summer. Their purpose is twofold: numerous players have made an offseason home in the Chapel Hill area, so they're living and working out nearby on a daily basis. Also, of course, some of the best pickup basketball in the country can be found on a daily basis in the Smith Center, providing an easy way for players to stay sharp. There's rarely a time, day or night, that you walk by the Smith Center practice gym without hearing a ball bouncing.
“Every single one of them makes us better,” Theo Pinson said. “Kendall (Marshall) has been back all summer helping us out with that toughness mindset. He's a great driver and great playmaker. Jawad (Williams) has a knack to score, and Reyshawn (Terry) is a monster. David Noel and Tyler Hansbrough played with us yesterday. Those guys show us the work ethic and what it takes to get to the next level.”
In fact, you never know when you might run into a Tar Heel. Justin Jackson said that Marvin Williams spoke to the assembled prospects at the NBA Combine this summer.
Defense: In that column from earlier this week, it was noted that Joel Berry II won the second-most team defensive awards during the 2015-16 campaign. A couple of emailers asked who won more than Berry. The answer, not surprisingly, is Marcus Paige, who won it ten times. A possible good sign for this year's team: Paige is the only one of the seven players who won the award last year who does not return this season (Berry, Isaiah Hicks, Justin Jackson, Nate Britt, Luke Maye and Kennedy Meeks all were winners—the biggest upset being that Theo Pinson never won it).
Getting swole: Summer is the time when Jonas Sahratian is often at his most creative when designing workouts for the Tar Heels. While there hasn't been any pickup truck pulling in the parking lot (yet), Jackson believes this has been the toughest offseason in his Carolina career, and Hicks looks exhausted just relaying his most rigorous offseason session with Sahratian, which the strength and conditioning coach refers to as “CVs,” short for cardiovascular.
“It's probably the worst thing I've ever done,” Hicks says. “He felt so bad for me that he only made me do three sets instead of four. Twelve different stations make up one set, and it's stuff like the military press, hammer curls, regular curls, clap push ups, squat jumps, and things like that.
“Coach (Steve) Rob did one set, and he was on the floor. He said his day had passed, and that getting out of shape was easy, but getting in shape is hard.”
Notes: Paige was back in town briefly on Tuesday…Work continues on a dramatic renovation of the player space in the Smith Center, including an impressive new locker room, lounge, and film room/theater…The league hopes to release the full 2016-17 ACC basketball schedule next week…Nate Britt likes Tony Bradley as the player to surprise among the freshmen. “He's going to turn a lot of heads,” Britt says. “He still has a lot of growth that he has to make with learning our system. But just watching him in the summer, he's extremely skilled, runs the floor, has a big body and doesn't back down from anybody.”
