In case you missed it, my Carolina Tar Heels started the 2007-2008 season with a somewhat shaky win against unranked Davidson College. While most people will be surprised to hear that the #1 ranked team in the country struggled against Davidson, it turns out that Davidson actually has a very solid team. They won 29 games last season, a team that lost to Maryland in the first round of the NCAAs, and returned all of their starters.
Needless to say, the Tar Heels didn't look particularly sharp in the season opener. Three good things and three not so good things about the game from my inexperienced point of view:
The Good
1. Wayne Ellington, Nat's favorite player and now sporting a new number (2 last season, 22 this season), looked sharp shooting from the outside and could be the clutch outside shooter that will prevent teams from collapsing on Tyler.
2. Tyler had a double-double (12 points, 12 boards) by the first half.
3. Hit shots in the clutch. Last season the team struggled to win close games. It was blowout or naught.
The Bad
1. Deon Thompson looked overmatched in replacing Brandan Wright. Wright was drafter in the first round of the NBA draft after a solid Freshman season and now Deon gets the starting spot next to Tyler. Unfortunately, Deon looked a little shaky and nothing like the guy with the sweet turnaround shot. Expect him to rebound from this though.
2. Ty Lawson looked nothing like his old self until the end of the game. Lawson had no assists, which is bad coming from your PG, and didn't start using his explosive speed to drive to the basket until late in the game. Bobby Frasor replaced Lawson in the 1st half and did a wonderful job.
3. FG shooting in the 2nd half. The Heels shot 9-26 (34.6%) in the 2nd half and 4 of 13 from behind the arc. Tyler had 2 points in the 2nd half due in part to Davidson collapsing on him and in part due to him not getting the ball enough. This translated in shots further away from the basket that were just not falling.
Either way, the win was against a solid team and you have to just learn from your mistakes and move on.
Next up: Iona (0-2) Sunday November 18th at 6:00 pm Eastern in Chapel Hill.
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5 comments:
Funny stuff. I tried to send you a very similar assessment by email last night, but I was having some trouble with my email account.
I've got tickets to the games on Sunday and Tuesday, so I'll give you an in-person report early next week.
A few things I'd add to your report- I thought that the Heels got good play off the bench from Bobby Frasor and Danny Green. Q was solid as well. Marcus Ginyard's defense was exceptional against Curry.
I'm sure that Lawson will rebound. Similarly, I think Hansbrough just got a little shaken by the second half technical (which was bogus, by the way). However, the big concern coming out of this game is Thompson and Stepheson. This isn't a Final Four team if they can't play better than that.
The refs were clearly off their game with some of the calls. I loved everyone off the bench.
I agree Deon or Stephenson have to step up for this team to make any noise come March.
I'd like to report that Stella has started her "I really hate basketball" campaign off with a bang.
A fun night in the Smith Center tonight. I don't know if you get ESPNU, but if not, you missed the best dunks of Tyler's career. Iona isn't very good, which makes any critical evaluation tough, but I was very encouraged by the team's perimeter shooting and offensive balance.
I did not watch the game but had the score going on in Sportsline. I figured Iona wouldn't be too much of a challenge.
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