Heel Tough Blog: ETSU Preview
- Joshua Marlow
- 1 day ago
- 4 min read
After having to wait six days between the Georgetown win and the USC Upstate win, the Tar Heels are back in action just three days after beating the Spartans, as they host a solid ETSU team tonight in the Smith Center. The win over USC Upstate improved Carolina’s record to 9-1 on the season, the program’s best start since the 2017-18 season, when Carolina would earn a #2 seed in the NCAA Tournament. After a 1-0 week, the Tar Heels find themselves now ranked 12th in the AP Poll, with conference play on the horizon. Carolina will look to put together a better performance tonight, after sleepwalking through the win over Upstate, which drew the ire of not only Tar Heel fans, but their head coach as well.
ETSU brings with them an 8-3 record this season, and has long been a quality program in the SoCon. All three of their losses have come on the road, coming to Presbyterian, Dayton, and in-state foe Austin Peay. They have three players who average double figures in scoring, led by Cam Morris III, and his 14.2 points per game, on 64% shooting from the field, and 55% shooting from behind the arc. Brian Taylor II (13.7) and Blake Barkley (12.2) are the other ETSU players averaging double figures. Those three lead an offense that averages over 80 points per game.
On his coach's radio show on Monday, Hubert Davis did allude to Seth Trimble nearing his return from an injury her suffered back in the first week of the season. As of last week, Trimble had yet to take part in five-on-five action, but he has since cleared that hurdle, competing in drills with contact. UNC shouldn’t need Trimble on the court to win tonight, but it’s hard to imagine Hubert Davis putting him out there against Ohio State, a game that will be more intense, more physical, without prior action to see where his conditioning is.
Carolina has three games over the next six days, which will conclude the non-conference season, because after the Christmas break, it’s all ACC games up until the NCAA Tournament. Tonight is the first game of that final stretch, and after an uneven performance against Upstate on Saturday, UNC will look to put together a more complete performance from start to finish. Here’s what to watch during tonight’s contest:
Energy. Effort. Enthusiasm: Every coach has their catch phrase, and this is Hubert Davis’s, and he made it known after the Upstate win, that he wasn’t happy with the way his team played, mainly pointing out their energy, effort, and enthusiasm. Look, the college basketball season is a long one, and when you schedule the way UNC has with so many “buy games, it makes it even longer, but there is a standard that this team has set for itself, in terms of how they play, and they didn’t meet the mark on Saturday afternoon. Considering the leadership on this team and the way they’ve responded at different times this season, expect a more complete performance tonight, in the last tune-up before the Ohio State game this weekend.
Defend the 3: The recipe for a mid-major program to either pull off an upset or be competitive is to hit a number of shots from the perimeter. Upstate was able to do that on Saturday, going 10-27 from the outside, allowing them to hang around until the final media timeout of the game. Now, ETSU isn’t a great shooting team, as they shoot just 32% from the outside, but their three double-digit scorers all shoot 37% or better from the outside. After the way that UNC handled some ball-screen action on the perimeter, expect ETSU to put Carolina’s bigs in conflict on the outside, to see if they handle them better this time around. If not, UNC could find itself in another close game against a mid-major opponent.
Rebound. Rebound. Rebound: On paper, Carolina averages roughly 5 more rebounds per game than ETSU, and that should translate onto the court, in a bigger way than their rebounding effort against Upstate did on Saturday, when they only outrebounded the Spartans by 3, and were outrebounded on the offensive glass, 11-7. Now Caleb Wilson and Henri Veesaar did their job, combining to grab 20 of the 37 rebounds, but there wasn’t the effort from the others that we’re used to seeing. In his postgame presser, Davis lamented their lack of rebounding, circling back to the lack of energy, effort, and enthusiasm. At this point, it’s fair to expect Caleb Wilson and Henri Veesaar do their job, but they need help on the glass to impose their will against a smaller, less talented opponent.
Series History:
Carolina is 6-0 all-time against ETSU, with the last win coming all the way back in 2012. UNC is 5-0 against the Buccaneers in Chapel Hill, including 2-0 in their current home venue.
KenPom:
North Carolina - 27th overall. Adjusted Offensive Efficiency: 118.8 (43rd) Adjusted Defensive Efficiency: 97.7 (24th)
ETSU - 116th overall. Adjusted Defensive Efficiency: 111.0 (120th) Adjusted Defensive Efficiency: 105.6 (118th)
NET:
North Carolina - 20th.
ETSU - 100th.
TV Info:
Tonight’s game will air on the ACC Network, starting at 8 PM. \
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