Lucas: Frustration

By Adam Lucas

Most of us have very little experience with this.

As Carolina basketball fans, we have seen frustrating games. Of course we have. Look, we're all miserable already, might as well list a few. 1998 Utah, for example. 2008 Kansas. 2016 Villa…well, you know.

But even though all of us have that one frustrating loss that still hurts our heart—if you're of a certain generation, maybe it's 1977 Marquette or 1984 Indiana—we've all been extraordinarily blessed in this way: the frustration is usually limited to just a game.

If Thursday night's 68-59 loss to Virginia is indeed the end of Carolina's NCAA Tournament hopes, as many bracketologists seem to believe, then it will be the last painful reminder of what made the 2022-23 campaign so unique: this time, the frustration lasted for the entire season.

This was a year that it just never fit. Not in November, when the Tar Heels lost a four-overtime game to Alabama. Not in February, which opened with three straight losses. And certainly not in March, which as of now includes a 1-2 record.

As of now, the primary thing this season has given us is the all-time preseason reference point on how every single team is different. It doesn't matter how many players return. It doesn't matter how similar it looks on paper. If you lived through the 2022-23 Carolina basketball season, then congratulations, you'll forever point to this year as the example of how running it back should come with a warning label.

The end was…fitting. There were injuries and turnovers and errant shots. So, so many errant shots. Carolina couldn't score enough to keep up with Virginia, but here's the stunner: the Tar Heels also couldn't defend well enough to prevent a Cavalier surge. In the key stretch of the game—the opening segment of the second half, after Carolina had cut the deficit to one point at halftime—Virginia scored on six straight possessions. Counting one trip when they went 0-for-2 at the free throw line, they had points or a reasonable facsimile on 14 of their first 17 possessions of the second half.

Considering that the Tar Heels were essentially playing—and defending—for their postseason lives, that's a frustrating result.

This is where we should pause and remember that it is not all about us. If you think we're frustrated, imagine how the players and coaches involved must feel. They're the ones who have spent hours every day in the Smith Center, who have lifted every weight and devised every scouting report and watched every second of film.

All to get to this exact month, the very best time in the very best sport, and now it looks like they might not even be part of it. If you and I aren't sure what to do with a world where it's March 10 and Tar Heel basketball might be over, imagine how they feel.

We've watched this particular Carolina team for 33 games. Maybe we never quite figured them out, which shouldn't really surprise you, because maybe they never figured themselves out, either. As RJ Davis said, "It's not the expectations we had."

But only tonight, after those 33 games, have we realized something even more frustrating than watching them play a 34^th game:

Not watching them play again at all.

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University of North Carolina Athletics

Players Mentioned

RJ Davis

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