Not So Crazy At Cameron

It was inevitable, at least in my eyes, that North Carolina would take Duke to the woodshed last night. It took some yelling and screaming at halftime, but eventually that ended up being the case. Duke consistently struggles in recent years with teams who have more athletic players than them and last night was no different. Let's not start with Duke, however, because the focus of the game should be North Carolina.

UNC brought their best game for 30 of the 40 minutes. They started out by attacking Duke inside and used their length and athleticism to slow the Duke offense. But after gaining an early lead, they turned down their intensity level and starting getting lazy on the defensive end. Carolina actually struggled when Duke pushed the hot pace right back at them towards the end of the half. UNC started rushing questionable shots and the speed of the game took some energy away from their defensive effort. After halftime, Carolina came out focused and the key was Ty Lawson. No one on Duke can keep him out of the lane, but he didn't seem into the game early on. Once he flipped the switch in the second half, it was game over for the Blue Devils. Hansborough only had nine shots, making six, and didn't force himself into the offense. I thought they could've used him more, but it was nice to see they could win without him being dominant. Dion Thompson and Ed Davis provide a nice compliment to Hansborough inside. The only problematic thing for UNC was the play of freshman PG Larry Drew off the bench. He looked unprepared for such a big stage. The bottom line for the Tar Heels is that we saw they can play as well as anyone, offensively and defensively, when they are focused on the task at hand.

It's the same story as always for Duke, but I'll note a few things. Greg Paulus had zero points in the second half after providing all the energy in the first half. Duke was only in the game because of a great shooting stretch when UNC took down the intensity level. It might seem odd that Duke, a good defensive team, gave up so many points, but they just don't have the personnel to D up Carolina. There was a long stretch in the second half where Duke couldn't score and it was a result of two factors. Gerald Henderson disappeared offensively and floated around instead of looking for the rock and driving it. Secondly, when you don't have a post presence (yes, we're beating a dead horse), it's harder to get easy scores. If you live by the three, you die by the three. Typically, Coach K went away from using his bench (zero minutes for Louis Williams) in a bigger game. If there's one positive, it was that Nolan Smith looked less lost.