From 11 to 8; lack of depth could hurt Heels
Feb 4, 2009
Tags: ACC
"I laughed in the fall when everybody was talking about 'Was I worried about having too many players?' I said, no, I just wanted to make sure I had enough. I think my worry was more on mark as opposed to the ones worried about too many."
That was North Carolina head coach Roy Wiiliams on Monday of this week during the ACC coaches teleconference. He likely already knew what we found out last night; neither Marcus Ginyard nor Will Graves will play the rest of the season for the Tar Heels.
That essentially leaves Carolina's basketball team with an eight man rotation. UNC started the year with a legitimate 11 guys that could play quality minutes. The starters - Tyler Hansbrough, Deon Thompson, Danny Green, Wayne Ellington and Ty Lawson - will be leaned on heavily for the Heels if this team is to reach it's goals of a national championship this season. Only three other players currently available to Roy Williams have seen quality minutes this year. Big man Ed Davis, and point guards Bobby Frasor and Larry Drew II will likely be the only guys providing any meaningful bench play for the Tar Heels.
"This is an excellent opportunity to show what type of character this Carolina basketball team has," Ginyard said after the announcement that he was done for the season on Tuesday night. "There's no doubt about it, that every national championship team has had to overcome some type of obstacle."
An eight man rotation isn't bad. A lot of teams would trade places with Carolina in a heartbeat. Let's be honest, that's probably the most talented starting five in the nation. Add in two options at back-up PG and a big man who can score, rebound and block shots; the Heels are still among the nation's elite. No one here is crying for the Tar Heels, just to be clear.
However, Carolina's sudden lack of depth will be a serious obstacle on the road to a title. Of the three bench players, only one brings a real scoring option. Ed Davis averages 6.8 points per game for Carolina. He's also on pace with Hansbrough, leading the team in rebounding with 7.6 per game. But, Davis is the only non-starter for Carolina that poses a scoring threat to the opposition.
Frasor and Drew average a combined 4.4 points per game. While your instinct may be to say that number can improve with more minutes, don't count on it. Ty Lawson's minutes are perhaps more valuable than anyone's. The Heels rely on Lawson more than any other player to thrive in transition, which is what Carolina lives on. Also, Frasor's 30% from the field this season doesn't point to a leap in scoring any time soon.
All five of Carolina's starters are averaging double figures in the scoring category. Roy Williams hopes that continues, and maybe the Heels won't need bench scoring. But Williams does have hopes that the rotation won't stop at his eighth guy.
"We've lost three of our top nine guys now, so the depth is not there... I'm hoping we can go nine. I'm hoping we can get Cope in there. That's a goal for us, anyway."
So, maybe Mike Copeland can bear some of the load. But, asking for big minutes down the stretch from a guy who's never played big minutes before is a huge unknown.
Then comes the issue of defense. Who will be THE defensive stopper for Carolina this season? Who does Williams think is the Heels' best defensive player right now?
"Right now it's me. That's the bad thing," the coach mused Tuesday evening. "I have no idea. We don't have a lockdown guy." Williams believes team defense will have to be strong from here on out. That's something he thinks is improving. "I think we have been better defensively... At times this year, we've been better defensively than we were all year last year."
This is a far cry from what the 2008-09 UNC team was expected to be. Only time will tell if the Tar Heels can overcome. But, Marcus Ginyard believes they can.
"It will be even better when this team gets to where they want to be, and reaches their goals even through all of this."
--Adam Harris is a reporter and producer for 99.9 FM The Fan. He's covered Carolina basketball this season for The Fan & WRALSportsFan.com
