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UNC has entered the danger zone of the college basketball season.
With a 4-4 record before the ACC season begins and still two challenging non-conference games against Florida and UCLA on neutral floors, Carolina faces early residence on the NCAA Tournament bubble that brings back some bad memories in this century.
The infamous 8-20 season of 2001-02 began 5-5 that had the Tar Heels of coach Matt Doherty on the bubble after 10 games before losing 11 of the next 12 on the way to UNC’s worst record in modern history.
With a depleted roster following Roy Williams’ second national championship, his 2010 team was still ranked in mid-January before losing 10 of 12 that sent Ol’ Roy to the NIT, losing to Dayton in the Madison Square Garden finale.
And, of course, rookie head coach Hubert Davis followed up his heroic 2022 Final Four season with four starters back that had a February swoon of six losses, wound up 20-13 and declined an NIT bid to revamp his roster.
His 2023-24 team with three new starters won the ACC regular season, sweeping Duke and going all the way to the NCAA Sweet Sixteen before losing a heartbreaker to Alabama that set up a highly anticipated rematch Wednesday night.
His current entry has not come close to replacing Armando Bacot, Harrison Ingram and Cormac Ryan and finds itself with an unstable roster that forced Davis to go to a four-guard starting lineup. It shot miserably in a 94-79 home loss to the 10th-ranked Crimson Tide team that has improved from a year ago.
But it happened in a strange way. The smaller Heels outrebounded the Tide 42-40 and 15-8 on the offensive glass. But the scoring-minded guard quartet made only 14-of-46 from the floor and 2-for-23 from the 3-point line. Their best player on this night was another guard, freshman Ian Jackson, who came off the bench to put up a career-high 23 points with 9 from downtown.
So what is Davis to do now as Georgia Tech comes in Saturday for the conference opener? Jackson and Davis both spoke after the game about a lack of toughness, which sounds like lip service for what should have had the Heels frothing at the mouth to see the Crimson-uniformed opponent.
Bacot and Ingram, the ACC’s leading rebounders last season, are not walking through the door to protect the paint, where Alabama scored 44 of its points plus adding 12 long balls that gave the Tide a 21-point advantage from outside to deal UNC its worst loss since 2022.
R.J. Davis is still in his early season slump, going 1-of-11 from the arc and lowering his 3-point rate to 24 percent. Seth Trimble, Carolina’s best player through the first seven games, came back to earth with a 4-for-13 shooting night, and Elliot Cadeau missed all four of his shots, but the smallest guy on the court led his team with 6 rebounds.
That says it all about this upside-down cake that Carolina baked.
Featured image via Todd Melet
Art Chansky is a veteran journalist who has written ten books, including best-sellers “Game Changers,” “Blue Bloods,” and “The Dean’s List.” He has contributed to WCHL for decades, having made his first appearance as a student in 1971. His “Sports Notebook” commentary airs daily on the 97.9 The Hill WCHL and his “Art’s Angle” opinion column runs weekly on Chapelboro.Chapelboro.com does not charge subscription fees, and you can directly support our efforts in local journalism here. Want more of what you see on Chapelboro? Let us bring free local news and community information to you by signing up for our newsletter.
Time to see what James Brown can do? A Brown-Lubin-Withers rotation at the 4-5? More time for Claude? Who knows but the Heels often play like they think Bacot is still on the court. The team CAN play passionate defense for stretches but can’t sustain it. Cadeau and Tyson have to stop hesitating on their shots when they’re open. This team is worlds better than the 2001-02 team. Powell and Jackson are going to be amazing. Thank goodness Trimble came back. The coaches AND players can figure this out but the clock is ticking.
Pretty much agree. 2001-2 team didn’t play the level of competition this team has. Perhaps 4-4 is not so bad all things considered. If you can’t make your shots fall it’s going to be a tough game all around, and that’s where we are. Get us to 33% from three and this is a different team and probably 6-2 or even 7-1.
No guarantee’s. The Heels must get the shooting slump behind them or it’s going to be a tough year.