Art’s Angle: Don’t Cry – Chapelboro.com

Don’t cry, Carolina alumni and fans. It’s only one basketball game — albeit a poorly played one by the Tar Heels. Remember 11 months ago, when they had Armando Bacot and better transfers and clinched the ACC regular season at Cameron Indoor Stadium?

Saturday’s drubbing at Duke was predictable, given the Blue Devils’ decided advantages of depth, superior size and talent this season. The 87-70 final score looks far more respectable than when the Heels were down by 30 points midway through the second half. It was UNC’s ninth Quad 1 loss, which is the most important metric for an invite to the NCAA Tournament.

But if your pride is wounded, Carolina would likely lose to this Duke team nine out of 10 times. Defeats to closer equivalents Michigan State, Florida, Louisville, Stanford, Wake Forest and Pitt are far more the reason for falling short of an at-large bid. Those are/were all Quad 1 and Quad 2 teams when they played UNC.

Carolina may not drop much from its No. 41 NET ranking, since its 10th loss overall and fifth in the ACC was on the road against a favorite to win the national championship. UNC could still qualify for the NCAA Tournament by winning the next eight games — the last six of which are against teams in the lower half of the ACC standings — before Duke comes to Chapel Hill for the regular season finale.

Don’t fault Hubert Davis purely for the result. Yes, there’s been some questionable coaching, but it is only magnified by holes in his rotation that could have been filled with more NIL money that Davis may now be getting thanks to the Bill Belichick barometer. Hubert’s most athletic power forward is on the way. Watch former Tar Heel national champions Theo Pinson and Raymond Felton talk about what has happened to college basketball and their school.

Yes, Davis deserves his share of blame for the slow starts his team has had so often. Until recently, the 54-year Davis was a hardliner from the Dean Smith era of no pay for play. But any promises for discipline rarely come in front of a microphone.

“I told them in the huddle with about four or five minutes to go in the game that I couldn’t be happier with the group than the one that I’m looking at right now,” Davis said after the loss in his fatherly fashion.

Really? Wouldn’t he have been happier if his team wasn’t outscored 33-7 in the guts of the first half? Especially as Duke super frosh Cooper Flagg and Kon Knueppel were on their way to combining for 43 points on 13 for 25 shooting, 13 rebounds, 12 assists, 5 steals and 3 blocks in 73 of the 80 possible minutes?

Let’s admire Duke, which has a far wealthier alumni base and figured to be a big player once the NIL era began without guidelines or guardrails. That is why any mistakes by third-year coach Jon Scheyer are not debated as he continues to sign 5-stars and solid transfers who accept supporting roles, giving the Blue Devils among the most balanced and dangerous rosters in college basketball. Having won 16 straight, they are on a different level right now with those talents and financial investment.

Duke’s Cooper Flagg defends a shot from UNC’s Seth Trimble during the second half on Saturday. Flagg’s performance showed why he’s regarded as the top talent not just in this year’s freshman class, but all of college basketball. (Photo via AP Photo/Ben McKeown)

The good news: with so many college athletes turning pro or entering the portal, opponents often face stars like Flagg –the 6-foot-9 and 205-pound phenom from Newport, Maine – for one season before they disappear from the conference or from college basketball entirely. It was Flagg’s third and last three-pointer with under 10 minutes left in the second half that gave Duke a 74-44 lead — and only as both teams played out the long-decided game with less intensity did the Tar Heels show some of their best basketball.

“I was really proud of the fight of our guys in the second half,” Hubert said, another tired line he pulls out when his Tar Heels battle back from early deficits of their own making. “I thought they competed. I thought they played well. And one of the things that I have been proud about this group is it has continued to compete and fight.”

That may have been something Davis’ mentors Smith and Roy Williams said before making them run more sprints during practice the next day. With NIL now controlling college basketball as much as football, coaches can still discipline their players like Tennessee’s Rick Barnes, who pulled one of his transfers from a game recently. “I took him out because he didn’t shoot when he had an open shot,” Barnes said. “I told him shooting is why we pay him. So his butt was on the bench.”

Scheyer’s mentor is Mike Krzyzewski, one of the strictest coaches during his Hall of Fame career — and the protégé can certainly be hard on his players, who often overcome their miscues with great playmaking on both ends of the court.

Davis could be angry over the costly mistakes his team has been making lately. In the last two games, the Tar Heels have given up 41 points off their 28 turnovers. They were a major reason why Duke was able to quickly run up the score and feel confident Carolina would not, realistically, be troubling them with a close game.

Six Tar Heels scored more points in the second half at Cameron than the first, when the score was heading for 45-23. After the break, Ven-Allen Lubin, Ian Jackson, Elliot Cadeau, Seth Trimble, R.J. Davis and Drake Powell all made nice plays out of a fluid offense by moving the ball better and dribbling less. That was also because Scheyer emptied his bench and called off their trapping, suffocating, changing defenses that had already decided the game. As a good sport, he slowed the tempo down and ran the clock as Carolina “won” the second half 45-40.

ESPN basketball guru Jay Bilas likes to say that the Duke-UNC rivalry “always delivers.” Not this time. It was rotten for the rivalry and huge TV audience that watched early, if not late. And it was bad for the Tar Heels’ NCAA bubble hopes they may be hanging onto for dear life. But, again, it was predictable based on Carolina’s season so far.

UNC doesn’t play again until the home rematch with Pitt on Saturday, and between now and then Davis will decide which “pivots” and “tweaks” he will use, such as the zone he said they practiced for Duke and seemed to be somewhat effective — although any improvement.

“The most important thing I told the guys after the game was just to stay together and stay the course,” Hubert said. “What other choice do you have? I love coaching these kids and I believe in this team. We’ve been together for almost a year now and been to a lot of practices and games and trips. This team is really close.”

Unfortunately, UNC may also be close to missing the NCAA tournament for the second time in three years – unless they can maximize and blend their individual abilities for the greater good. Duke’s team is already doing that, and Saturday’s game was just the latest example.

Featured image via AP Photo/Ben McKeown.

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.

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