CHAPEL HILL, N.C. - Not many teams call players’ only meetings after losing an ACC opener. Or see players reduced to tears in the locker room after falling to 0-2 in conference play.
Such is life as a North Carolina Tar Heel. Even after losing four starters from last season’s Elite Eight team to the NBA draft, even though they have a freshman point guard trying to adjust, it’s shocking to the system.
“This is Carolina,” said Marcus Paige, that freshman point guard. “We expect to win every game we play.”
People outside the state of North Carolina might be hard-pressed to tell Dexter Strickland from Reggie Bulloch, but they might recognize these names: Al Wood and James Worthy, Vince Carter and Antawn Jamison, Ty Lawson and Tyler Hansbrough.
All six of those stars played on the only other three North Carolina teams to start the ACC 0-2. All three finished second or higher in the ACC and went to the NCAA tournament, including two trips to the Final Four and the 2009 national championship.
Bulloch and James Michael McAdoo drew on that history, which coach Roy Williams reminded them of, while winning at Florida State and at home against Maryland to even their ACC record. The Tar Heels (12-5, 2-2) host Georgia Tech (10-6, 0-4) on Wednesday night.
“When we go out there and play with a sense of urgency and the crowd is into it, we’re into it,” McAdoo said. “We’re just out there losing ourselves in the game like Coach always says.”
In 10 seasons since Williams returned to North Carolina, the Tar Heels have won two national titles, followed by exoduses to the NBA. Last season’s team might have won a third national title, giving Kentucky the test it never faced, if point guard Kendall Marshall hadn’t fractured his wrist in the Tar Heels’ second-round win over Creighton.
An NBA exodus followed anyway, as Marshall, Harrison Barnes, John Henson and Tyler Zeller all went in the top 17 picks of the first round. With Zeller the only senior, it marked the third time Carolina has had three underclassmen drafted since 2005.
The seasons that followed went one of two ways. In 2006, led by the freshman Hansbrough, the Tar Heels went 23-8 and advanced to the second round of the NCAA tournament. In 2010, the Tar Heels went 20-17 (5-11 in the ACC) and wound up in the NIT.
“They stand today as examples of one of the best coaching jobs Roy Williams has ever done and one of the worst coaching jobs Roy Williams has ever done,” said David Glenn, editor of ACC Sports Journal and host of a state-wide syndicated sports talk show in North Carolina. “In 2006, he put up a very strong season by most standards, despite dealing with leftover parts and second-team all-state guys and incoming freshmen and little used role players. … In 2010, there were injuries, chemistry problems, and the pieces just did not come together.”
Something all three teams have in common were questions at point guard. Bobby Frasor answered with a steady hand in 31 starts as a freshman in 2006, while Larry Drew II struggled in 2010 and became one of three players to transfer, along with Travis and David Wear.
“After they won it in ’05, we had zero expectations coming in,” said Frasor, now director of basketball operations at UAB. “We weren’t ranked. Sports illustrated said we weren’t going to make the tournament. We were able to play with a chip on our shoulder all year. Whereas this team, they’re very young. They lose so much in the NBA draft, yet they’re preseason top 15. It’s probably unwarranted, and it showed early in the year.”
Two traits that great Carolina teams seem to have are a fast and skilled point guard and a dominant big man. Marshall and Zeller. Ty Lawson and Hansbrough. Raymond Felton and Sean May. Jimmy Black and Sam Perkins.
But on this team, Paige is still adjusting to the pace Williams likes to play, and McAdoo, who is their best post player, likes to face-up more than play with his back to the basket. Their best two players, wing Bulloch and McAdoo, are more comfortable creating in space.
“UNC has been spoiled over the years by usually having a lot more talent than everybody else,” Glenn said. “The reality with this team at this stage of the season is it has two special players.”
Bulloch and McAdoo scored 43 of the team’s 62 points against Maryland. P.J. Hairston has been hot and cold. Dexter Strickland seems more of a complimentary combo guard. Center Desmond Hubert is defensive-specialist.
“The fork in the road that will determine whether this team turns out more like 2006 or more like 2010, I think is the freshmen,” Glenn said.
For Paige, the next step is consistency with his jump shot, and for center Brice Johnson, it’s his defense. They have 14 more ACC regular-season games to help this team define what it’s about.
“They took their licks early, but I think they’re starting to get things rolling here,” Frasor said.
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