random thoughts

• Ok, we lost to State, it sucks but we hopefully will still be 8-4. I dont think (like some other's do) that we will be invited to the Champs Sports Bowl (slotted for the 4th best ACC team). If everything works out the way it should Saturday (which it won't) there will be 1 9-3 team (BC) and a log jam of 8-4 teams (VT, GT, UNC, Miami, and FSU) with VT and BC playing a boring ACC Championship contest. If VT wins (and they will), they get Orange and my money is on FSU and GT getting Peach and Gator (or vice versa) because noone wants BC. That leaves Miami, UNC and BC in the running for the 4th best bowl and I bet that they go with Miami because they are closest to Orlando. Which leaves UNC for the Care Care Bowl. Look, i guess since its the 2nd season of Davis I'll take it, but its just a downer that this season has really turned into a "what could have been."
• The Tom O'Brien "We are the best program in the State" quote is getting alot of people up in arms. I dont know why. I guess him using the word 'program' is different then if he had used 'team'. NCSU proved they are the best team in NC this year by flat out winning every game against NC opponents. Like Butch says, its way to early to determine which school has the better football program. O'Brien knows that he is getting outrecruited by Davis, and this is why he said this, oh and to feed the egos of NCSU's inferiority-complex driven fans.
• The UNC- NCSU rivalry amoung fans is really hard to describe totally. Most rivalries can just be summed up by using the word "hate". But i reserve that word for the school in Durham. But the NCSU/UNC fans have much more familiarity with eachother than UNC-Duke ever can. I went to high school with alot of NCSU alums and we are all freinds. We are more or less the same demographic, unlike UNC/Duke fans. We are mostly all from NC, and we can get along and relate to eachother much more easily than most UNC/Duke combinations. Its a rivalry amoung brothers rather than a rivalry amoung people who dont know you and who you dont really know either.
• The Maui Invitational is without a doubt the best preseason tourney year in year out. Not just in the teams participating, but in the overall feel. Having been to one in 2001 and watched everyone since i can remember it is just an awesome event in person and on TV. The Lahuna (sp?) Civic Center is awesome, compare it to watching games from the cavernous-looking MSG like every other preseason tourney and there is no debate. BTW: What the hell ever happened to the Great Alaska Shootout?
• Speaking of: What the hell ever happened to Bobby Frasor's jump shot?
• Im very happy Michigan knocked off UCLA. I was like everyone who was looking forward to a UCLA-Duke game and possibly Duke's first loss. But then i watched with horror by how green UCLA looked and by the time it was over im very glad Michigan won. Why? Because if that UCLA had won they would have been completely dominated by Duke and there would have been the typical media hype-up of Duke by a bunch of people who dont really watch games and take preseason rankings as gospel. UCLA was in no way a top-10 team, and they would have made Duke look like a jugernaut. Which the media in turn would make them look like demi-gods. You know, like what they have made UNC out to look like.
• Were the fans at UCSB chanting "Fuck you Tyler"? Classy
• Tyler needs to come back soon if he is gonna break J.J's scoring record this year. I know, that is definitely not as important as chamionships in March but you know how good you would feel if he did break that record. It would be one of those things you would always remember and smile about, both out of your love for Tyler and your hatred of J.J.
• This could be the year UNC passes Kentucky on the all-time win list. Either this year or early next year (if trends continue). How awesome would that be if the two teams were tied for their game next year? I also think that the team that has the all time record should have a traveling banner for it. Really only three teams could contend for it on a night in night out basis (UNC, UK and KU). I just think it would be cool.

N.C. State at UNC

I Delayed writing about the events of last Saturday because I wanted it to soak in and give my feelings time to settle down a bit. But needless to say, I think we are all shocked and appalled by the utter beat down the Pack layed on UNC. It was reminiscent of Bunting Era Clemson-UNC games, except Bunting would later actually beat State. Look, I was not one who thought that UNC would win this game y 2 or 3 TD’s, I thought it would be close. But I at least thought Carolina would show up. I WAS WRONG.


In trying to remember what happened and in trying to analyze this atrocity of a football game only one thing really comes to mind: a complete and utter lack of preparation (and possibly motivation) coming into Saturday. State outplayed UNC in EVERY FACET OF THE GAME, a statement I never would have thought to say about this team. One thing that worries me about the team is this: do you remember the reputation some of those old Miami teams had where if they weren’t in contention to really do something with this season they would just kind of send it in? (Peach Bowl smack down by LSU in 2005) I would wonder if the loss to Maryland was so deflating to this team that they kind of adopted this mindset. I realize I’m reaching here but can you honestly give me a better reason for what happened on Saturday? You always hear the players say how Butch keeps talking about “getting to those games that have Blimps in the sky” and such, and if you talk about that all season, I wonder how you bounce back and keep playing after what you have aimed for is pretty much taken away last week at Maryland.


Of course, UNC still had the door open for Tampa ever so slightly after the Miami loss, which makes this even more inexplicable. As a fan I just can’t understand how THE ENTIRE TEAM didn’t show up for the game against YOUR RIVAL at HOME for a win that would pretty much LOCK UP THE FUCKING PEACH BOWL. Maybe Butch just doesn’t get into the whole rivalry thing very much (look at his record against FSU and VT while at Miami) and in turn neither do the players. This is obviously frustrating as a fan because we all remember the record against State and Duke that our former coach, a UNC alum that we kicked out the door, had. Either way it was without a doubt the most disappointing day in the last 2 seasons under Butch, and now we are all looking forward to driving to that mediocre bowl in Charlotte, again.

What is that word that pretty much sums up how we all felt after Saturday? Umm...lets see...oh yeah.....

Fuck.

Week 13: UNC @ Maryland

I-85/95 North coming from North Carolina into Virginia is a dark, long, depressing stretch of road void of seemingly all life or anything worth living for. That was my Thursday night, driving through the rain, trying to dodge the notorious Highway Patrol that has claimed the driving records of so many of my friends. Fortunately, I was not pulled over for speeding. Unfortunately, all momentum UNC had was brought to a dead stop on this road trip. I remember intently listening to the VT-Miami game, flying on a hope and a prayer that the Hurricanes could pull it out. I remember the long, dark, lonely trip seeming like the time of my life when Tech was stopped on 4th down to end the game. I remember how excited I was that UNC was in the driver’s seat. Just get past Maryland and we are in great shape. Just pull this one out. C’mon guys.


Fast forward about 48 hours and I’m in a parking lot in College Park with 4 college buddies. Surrounded by red-clad Maryland fans that all gave us the stink eye as soon as we get out of the car. All in all they were actually pretty nice to us. I had heard horror stories about Terp fans in the past, but those were mostly coming from Cole Field House when they were playing Duke, can’t say I really blame them. So we did the typical North Carolina kill ‘em with kindness thing and we were all playing flip-cup together before you knew it. It’s amazing what 12 beers can do.


My memories of the day then go something like this: Flip cup…damn it’s windy….rain drops….HEAVY RAIN DROPS…walking to the stadium…some fan talking shit…”screw you, Maryland is completely mediocre at every sport”…big stupid turtle shrine thing, might as well touch it…in our seats…kickoff. The football experience at Byrd Stadium can be summed up in two words: it sucks. Sure it was raining and only 48,000 showed up. But nothing about the stadium itself is appealing…at all. It’s got a very shoebox feel to it. Its almost like the equivalent of one of those “cookie-cutter” baseball stadiums, go to Tuner Field in Atlanta and you’ll know exactly what im talking about. They also don’t really do anything at all to make it an enjoyable experience for the fans. I’m talking about the presentation of the game, everything from the PA announcer to what they play on the speakers on 3rd down and so on and so forth. Sometimes this can be done very well and send goosebumps, sometimes very poorly and comes off as just stupid, but when it’s obvious that they just mail it in it kinda takes away from the whole experience.


We were good and sloshed when we took our seats and when I saw that snap go over the Maryland punters head I screamed like hell. Little did I know this was going to turn into one of the most sobering football games of the season. Basically, this was the fucking UVa game all over again, except it was raining. Look, a lot of the blame will go on Cam for this, and he wasn’t good, at all. But you also have to look at out O line only able to get 75 rushing yards, some awful drops by UNC receivers (namely Greg Little) and a missed 28 yard field goal. Some of this should go on John Shoop, like the inexplicable three pass plays after Maryland fumbled on the 38 yard line in the 3rd quarter. It was like the UVa game all over again in that UNC had opportunities to blow it open, and the defense played great, but UNC missed on them time and time again, and Maryland capitalized on their only chance.


So Sunday I found myself driving back down I-95/85 haphazardly listening to the Panthers game thinking about what could have been. As far as aftermath things go, everyone knows we blew this one. We blew the best shot we had to win the Coastal, by 2 pts. Now we have to regroup for a showdown with a now motivated NCSU team (damn you Wake!) and the planets pretty much need to align to win the coastal. People are upset but they need to chill, remember that this is only the 2nd season under Butch Davis and we have a shot at 9-3. Win two more games and maybe a Peach Bowl birth is in order. Who can’t smile at that? These next two games, these last two games, are about pride, as they always are. C’mon Heels.

Observations from Cameron

Saw my first game of the season in Cameron last night as Duke throttled the absolutely hapless Georgia Southern. It’s hard to take away much from a early November game against a JV team, but here’s what I thought stuck out, on and off the court.


· Gerald Henderson and Kyle Singler are the absolute cream of the Duke crop. This obviously isn’t a newsflash to really anyone who is familiar with Duke. But the point I’m trying to make here is that no-one on Duke’s roster is nearly as talented as Singler or as athletic as Henderson. I am not saying Duke is a two man team, but I am saying that after Singler, Henderson and maybe Scheyer, not a ton of players for Duke really scare me.


· Remember back when J.J. and Sheldon Williams were seniors, and every team that actually was able to contain J.J. made it a game, then someone like Lee Melchionni (sp? Does anyone care?) would supply the inevitable dagger. That’s what Scheyer and Paulus could be this year. The thing is, with Paulus coming off the bench and still no dominant post-presence I’m not sure K knows what his main offensive philosophy or rotation will be like this year. Speaking of…


· Nolan Smith is starting (at least for the first 2 games) over Paulus. I think K realized at the end of last year that if he is gonna compete with teams that have fast, athletic guards (like in the NCAA tournament) Smith, not Paulus, has to be the main guy. Getting Smith experience now will add to Duke’s depth. Smith can’t shoot as well as Paulus can, but he’s just a better athlete who can actually play college level defense. I can imagine that Paulus’ role on Duke in his senior season will be much like Bobby Frasor’s was before the MCL injury last year.


· Duke, through 2 games against JV opponents, is desperately trying to develop Zoubek. Im not saying it’s a lost cause, but it definitely going to be a very, very uphill battle. The kid at times just seems like he has no clue where he is on the court. It remains to be seen whether or not K sticks with this throughout the year. Right now, Brian Zoubek is what he’s always been at Duke, a 7-0 body mass with 5 fouls to give. The fans right now are supportive, but just wait, if he fucks up in a big way at a big time (say when/if they play UCLA), the natives will get really restless really quick.


· 12 players played 9 or more minutes last night. K’s trying to build depth and seems to have heard what everyone was saying about fatigue at he end of last year. But we see this from Duke in November tie and time again only to have it fade in early December. It’ll be interesting to see how long it lasts considering the aforementioned talent gap on the roster.


· It seems that K has learned from his mistakes and is trying to adjust. With the transition from Paulus to Smith, the addition of depth and the attempt to build an inside game, it seems like K has realized what he needs to do to compete with UNC and the rest of the country come March.


· The fan’s at Cameron aren’t scared by K’s threats. They just aren’t, and they wont be. Lots of empty seats last night, and no matter how much K gripes, its not gonna change when Georgia Southern comes to town.


· That said, Cameron Indoor Stadium just isn’t what it used to be. It’s not, and don’t let people like Dick Vitale tell you any different. I’m from Durham and have seen games at Cameron for years, both against crap teams and against the best North Carolina teams. I remember what it used to be, and its just not the same, hasn’t been for years. Unfortunately, really ever sense the 2001 NCAA Championship and sense ESPN ignorantly and falsely labeled Duke, Coach K and Duke students as ‘god’s gift to college basketball’ they simply read their own press and that’s when it left. Cameron is still a great place to watch a game, if you’re a Duke fan or have no feelings one way or the other (and I am neither), but the students aren’t nearly as in it or creative and neither are the alums, when they show up.


· Duke has a new scoreboard and they are into playing pre-game “hype-up” videos and all that stuff. Unfortunately, they just aren’t nearly as exciting or well produced then the one’s at the Smith Center are. The funniest thing about this is that I used to hear for years that “The atmosphere at Cameron is so good, that we don’t need that kind of video board, highlight real junk.” from Duke students and fans. Looks like they have also realized this is no longer the case.


· Duke has changed the look of its mascot, and it is much, much more gay.


· The absolute prettiest girl in the stadium last night was a UNC alumna, glad to see some things at Duke will never change.

Week 12: GT @ UNC

I’m actually going to deviate from my usual assessment of each Carolina game and NOT give you some long-drawn out first person story of a drunken Tar Heel and instead give a bullet point presentation of Saturdays events in Chapel Hill.

• 
  Noon games are quite terrible for the fans and probably the players as well. It’s never going to end well when you’ve already had 6 beers before 11:30. ABC execs should be kicking themselves for passing on what turned out to be a very good (and much more important) GT-UNC game and going with the FSU-CLEMSON game which was pretty much over mid-third quarter. With ABC not picking this game up it was left to the 3rd graders at Raycom, but thank god we didn’t get Ron Cherry.
  
  
• UNC’s defense was the personification of ‘bend-don’t break’ giving up 423 yards (326 rushing) but kept GT off the board until mid-4th quarter due to missed FG’s. We all knew GT was gonna own the ground, its just big we were able to stop them when it mattered. One thing you can say is that UNC looked well-prepared in stopping the option which is a testament to Davis and Withers.
  
  
• I was hoping this would be a let-down game for GT coming off their huge (season defining) win against FSU last week. I didn’t think it would happen, but it did. UNC played pretty well overall and was prepared, but just imagine if GT doesn’t muff that punt and if Jaybo Shaw didn’t fumble on the very next possession. The ACC has been a league this year decided by turnovers and defense, and the coin landed the right way for UNC in this one. These were mistakes GT didn’t make against Clemson and FSU. But they did against VT, and thank god they did again against UNC.
  
  
• Draughn and Houston are very good for the Heels right now, and they are both sophomores. The offensive line really showed up. Georgia Tech has possibly the best front line in the nation, but UNC still managed 186 running yards against them.
  
  
• The best place to hide airplane bottles is in a woman’s bra.
  
  
• The navy blue jerseys looked awesome. Don’t lie, you know they did. I’d love to see them with the blue pants. And stop it, they don’t look anything like Duke blue, they are navy, its one of our colors, always has been.
  
  
• T.J. is rusty and will be for a little bit. Sexton is unquestionably our best option at this point.
  
  
• Congrats to Hakeem Nicks, I doubt if we’ll see him in a UNC jersey next year.
  
  
• TE Zack Pianalto is injured again, this time with a broken leg. This sucks because we just got him back, and I think he helps our offense immensely, giving Sexton a safe check-down option. (See UNC’s first score Saturday.)
  
  
• UNC got a huge win Saturday, but still must win out to go to Tampa, and VT still needs to lose. Speaking of…
  
  
• Bad Maryland showed up against VT at Lane Thursday. I’ll say it again, I think the difference between bad and good Maryland is away and home. VT absolutely manhandled Maryland and you could tell they got to their pride a bit. What this means for UNC is not just a blown chance for another VT loss, but now UNC is heading to College Park to face a bunch of pissed off Terrapins who have had 10 days to prepare.
  
  
• Wake continues to help UNC, beating Virginia and Duke the last two weeks, not please take care of State this weekend. Ok? Thanks. I’d much rather play a Wolfpack with nothing to play for come next Saturday.
  
  
• NC State brought Duke back to reality with a 24-14 win. This means in all likelyhood that UNC will not have to go to Durham to face a 5-6 Duke team who would have a chance at a miraculous bowl season.
  
  
• I truly think that even if UNC doesn’t win out, 9-3 is good enough to entice the Peach Bowl people, and that would be awesome.
  
  
• UNC moved up to 16th in the BCS standings, and it would be a lot higher if 2/3 of the formula wasn’t dependent on idiot voters who only watch a handful of games and look only at records.
  
  
• 284 miles separate Chapel Hill, NC and College Park, MD and that’s what I will be driving Thursday night to see if the Heel’s can pull it off this weekend.

Week 11: What happened

Ok, Carolina had a bye week and we all got to watch the rest of the college football world change and alter all around us. Coming into the Bye, UNC was ranked #22 in the BCS and #21 in the AP while being in the middle of the pack in the ACC Coastal. As everyone knows, UNC started the day needing some help as far as the coastal division is concerned. So here's what happened:


Miami beats UVa. : As much as Miami shot themselves in the foot with seemingly billions of false-start penalties, UVa's couldn't capitalize and let Miami hang around. UVa was the much much better team in this game. Miami turned the ball over time and time again, and just looked lost for alot of the game. But again, because UVa couldnt put the ball in the endzone (partly bc of a good, fast Miami D) and because they have an incompetent kicker, the Hurricanes were never out of it. We all remember what happens when you dont capitalize off of these situations (see UNC vs. VT). Miami throws a bomb to the endzone that ties it, and they won in Overtime. UNC needed Virginia to lose twice. That's 1. This helped UNC in a huge way. UVa still needs to lose again, but with @WF, Clemson and @VT still ahead, who cant see it happening?


Georgia Tech beats FSU: I was rooting for FSU because i thought that all things considered, it would help UNC. Everyone will talk about how FSU fumbled at the goal line, but make no mistake, GT dominated this game. Then QB Nesbitt got hurt, and FSU took advantage of Freshman backup Shaw. But GT ran the ball very, very well and their defensive front is awesome. UNC needed to beat GT to have a chance in the coastal anyway, but I would much rather had been playing a 3-3 GT team then a 4-2 team. FSU's loss puts Maryland in the drivers seat in the Atlantic, and all Tar Heels should be rooting hard for the Terps thursday night at VT. But the way Maryland plays away from home, I'm sure they will crap the bed and not take advantage.


Clemson beats BC: I like this alot because if Clemson still believes it can do something with this season it helps UNC. Clemson's a team that has more talent than probably anybody, but mentally just hasnt been their for obvious reasons. CU still has Duke and Virginia, which will both be must wins. Go ahead and win both of those ones please Tigers. Ok? Thanks.


Wake Forest beats Duke: Great. I have mentioned before how UNC going to Durham to face a 5-6 Duke team scares the living hell out of me. If NC State beats Duke Saturday, I can't see this happeneing. Wake winning (as well as FSU losing), means that the Deacs still have hope of winning the Atlantic, if they win out. And the Cavs show up in Winston Salem this week.


Look,. UNC still has to win out to win the Coastal, but Miami beating UVa was the first part of a three part puzzle. GT scares the hell outta me, for alot of reasons, but we walk away from Saturday with the light at the tunnel a bit brighter than it was, and we'll take it.


As far as nationally goes, UNC might move up in the BCS standings due to #15 FSU, #17 Minnesota and #18 Tulso all losing. I realize this doesnt really matter, but hey, Im not really used to seeing UNC in the polls, so forgive me for at least being happy about it. Another good thing is that after Saturday there arn't really a ton of two or three loss teams left in the nation (#23-25, as well as about half of 'others receiving votes' all lost). There are more in the ACC, but this will decrease alot in the next two weeks. Again, i may be grasping at straws here, but this helps UNC as far as looking good for bowls, wiggle room in the polls, ect.