At this point, what can you really say? A Tar Heel team that was struggling on the offense prior to yesterday’s game lost their best scorer, likely for the season, and lost a game to a Wofford team that is nowhere near as good as they were a year ago. It might only be December, but this doesn’t feel like the struggles that we’ve seen from this team in the past few years.
The Tar Heels shooting woes don’t seem to be a fixable issue at this point, as this team has now gone the first ten games of this 2019-20 season without shooting at or above 50%, the longest since 1959. That means the ball has to go inside as often as possible to your best scoring options, something that didn’t happen on Sunday and was a reason they could score the basketball yet again. While it is understandable that Armando Bacot and Garrison Brooks aren’t the most talented bigs the Tar Heels have ever had, right now they’re your best chance to win games.
Entering Sunday, there was still some hope that this team was beginning to get healthy and might have a chance to correct some of the biggest issues surrounding this team. In the span of about three hours, all that hope seemed to vanish and rightfully so. There is still a chance this season can be salvaged because of the man coaching this team, but these players must buy in, something they haven’t done to this point. With a road trip to Spokane on Wednesday, gaining momentum won’t be easy.
-The Tar Heels ripped down 18 offensive rebounds on Sunday afternoon. Those offensive rebounds resulted in just ten second points, however. With this team’s continue struggled from mid-range and beyond, the Tar Heels bigs must be able to capitalize more often on those second chance opportunities, something they did a good job of doing in some of early season victories.
-The Tar Heels have struggled all season to create turnovers and forced just five against the Terriers on Sunday. One of the ways this team can make it easier on themselves is to get out on the fast break and take the ball to the rim. In order to do that, though, they must be smarter defensively and find a way to force opponents into turnovers and bad shots that have allowed them to be successful in the past. Looking to double has every time down the floor is something that needs to disappear with this team.
-There were a few positives to look at, but not many. All three point guards showed some promise, led by K.J. Smith who started his first career game at Carolina with Anthony out of the lineup. Smith wasn’t spectacular, but he took care of the basketball, turning it over only twice and add seven points. Both Anthony Harris and Jeremiah Francis continued to build off of their performances against Virginia and look like solid enough options off the bench. Andrew Platek also found his shooting stroke a bit, as well, knocking down two of his three 3-point looks.
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