Note: Originally posted by Alpha Wolf and amended on Wednesday by Jeff
State is obviously improving and has won back-to-back ACC wins for the first time this season. The Wolfpack also snapped a nine-game conference road game skid Saturday in Atlanta. For their part, UNC’s Tyler “Will.i.Am” Hansbrough loaned PG Ty Lawson some of his infamous determination last night. Lawson put that to good use in the final minutes of the UNC-Miami game, as he led the Tar Heels win 69-65 in Coral Gables.
On paper this looks like a Tarheel romp, and all indications are that will be how it plays out. Yet Another has some nice general statistics. Speaking of statistics, Section Six will statistically show you Tracy Smith’s impact on our offense by clicking here. With that said, I fully expect Smith to be in foul trouble and on the bench within the first eight minutes of tonight’s visit to Chapel Hill.
Caulton Tudor has gone so far as to say that the Wolfpack’s goal in Chapel Hill tonight is simply to ‘compete’. Honestly, I can’t disagree with him. The talent differential between these two rosters is just too large and is only accentuated by the strength of Carolina’s backcourt compared to the struggles of the Wolfpack’s backcourt (which is definitely improving).
Tudor makes a legitimate point about the debacle in Chapel Hill last year…
For all practical purposes, State’s 2007-08 season ended on Jan. 12 with a 93-62 loss in the Smith Center. Sidney Lowe’s second team entered that game at 11-3 overall, on a seven-game win streak and with a resume that included respectable wins over Davidson, Cincinnati, Seton Hall, South Carolina and Villanova.
But after one of the most humiliating first halves in school history (UNC 43, Pack 13), the Wolfpack disintegrated. State won only four more games and lost all sense of team unity. That’s how fast you can slide from 11-3 to 15-16 and into oblivion.
…but he fails to mention that was one of the Wolfpack’s first games without injured starting point guard, Farnold Degand and with struggling freshman, Javi Gonzalez. Degand wouldn’t have meant a Wolfpack win; but his presence would have made a huge difference in the manner in which we were embarrassed.
Don’t forget, the Wolfpack went to the halftime locker room down only 41-40 in his Coach Lowe’s first trip to Chapel Hill before Coach was rushed to the hospital during halftime. So, I am not convinced that this program just ‘naturally’ gets clobbered in Chapel Hill.
If NC State can have their best game of the year – and our bigs get fair enough treatment from the officials to get to the free throw line for a number of shots proportional with the contact that they draw – then Pack could have fighter’s chance tonight because of the improved play of Farnold Degand in the backcourt and Courtney Fells on the wing. The team is surely aware that a win would be money on any regular season resume. They’ll need a complete, forty minute effort against a Tar Heel squad starting to head towards its peak, and winning will be difficult. Thing is, this is the ACC and anything can happen.
* WRAL has a lot of insightful comments from Coach Lowe regarding changes, substitution rotation, our post play and more that you can see by clicking here. This is interesting stuff.
Starting with the Virginia Tech loss, the largest number of players that have seen more than a minute of playing time in any one game is eight…
…”[We are] just looking at our team, being fair, giving everyone an opportunity and trying to narrow that thing down to eight players.”
* The N&O has recognized that for the second straight year that no players from North Carolina high schools will be starting in tonight’s Game. (Click here)
This is the second straight season that neither basketball team has had a starter from North Carolina. The 2007-08 season was the first time in at least 29 years that all five starters from each team came from outside North Carolina.
* ACCNow also has a video podcast that can be seen by clicking here. We’d love to embed their stuff, but their technical department obviously falls short of the talent of JP Giglio’s impressive administration of the site.
