North Carolina

[yabbadabbadoo_rivals213851]

Wow. The worry that is North Carolina.
You guys need to adjust the thinking a little.
I think Auburn is red hot right now and Pearl has those guys playing with house money, and a big pile of it at that. I think Auburn would love a chance at revenge on us after beating them 2 times this year. Think this is what will happen too. We’ll have to figure that out if we survive Houston.

I think Auburn rolls over the cheats by at least 8 points and sets their aim directly at us. Problem is we gotta beat the fighting Drexlers first then worry about cooling the red hot Barkleys.

I’ll bet Ole Roy is dreading the hell out of playing Pearl’s white hot team. Probably worried his vertigo or whatever will resurface tomorrow night.

 

[CatColumbia]

They are playing their best ball. I’m not sold that we are. We’ve been surviving without Travis and now PJ.. we need everyone on board to beat them.

They are well coached, have good shooting in Maye and Johnson and solid depth. Colby is better than Hagans in my opinion. Hagans hasn’t had a game as good as he had against them and I don’t foresee him having that type of game against them again.

For us to win we’re going to need to dominate the paint and also have Herro and a few others hit their outside shots. I believe that Auburn will give them fits though so don’t be surprised to see the Tigers again.

 

[ubtrapper_rivals103836]

White is not a pUsH with Hagans. Not even close right now. There is no guarantee on a college floor in one game Pj will be better than Maye. I’d guarantee you UNC wouldnt make that trade.

Let’s not overdo it. If we face UNC in the tournament they get a revenge game and they are better than we are at this time imo.

That was the big road block the ncaa likes to give UK. UNC is their hitman for UK in the elite 8. Duke is kept safe away from it all.

I don't see UNC being better than us right now at all. They are a good team but so are we. They have a better PG right now and they have Maye. Their inside game is decent, ours is much better. Our bench is better as well.

 

[JC43]

Hagans has already owNed white, I believe he will so it again

 

[caneintally]

Can someone tell me why Little could be out for UNC? I saw someone else mention it but have seen nothing about it ?

 

[KyCatFan1]

Cal needs to push Johnson to drive every damn time and not settle for jump shots. If he’s wide open sure take a 3, but he’s at his best when he drives because more often than not he will get fouled and go to the ft line

He gets blocked more than any player I have ever seen.

How is Hagans better? He's scored in single digits 23 out of 35 games. White has only done that 7 times. Hell, White has three times more 30 point games as Hagans has 20 point games.

I get that playing great defensive is important, but PG's should either be scoring, assisting, or doing both. If a PG can't score 10 a game while being the primary ball handler he should be getting 7+ assists.

I think White has been playing better, but to be fair, Hagans isn't really asked to be a scorer. We have Johnson, Herro, and Washington for that.

Can someone tell me why Little could be out for UNC? I saw someone else mention it but have seen nothing about it ?

Flu like symptoms.

 

[hamcat]

Count me in as one that would rather play auburn. The cheats are eye test wise looking like a possible title team (just threw up a little). They are getting shots at the rim consistently and playing at the tempo they want. I just think cheats have more ways they could beat us than auburn.

That said, pearl has a week to get his team amped up and he’s great at getting teams to play with emotion. Ideally au comes out jacked to the moon and knocks out the cheats then falls totally flat against us!

I think we’re a nightmare matchup for au and still match up well with cheats. I just keep getting gut feeling that if we play the cheats, it’s going to b same situation as 2017 in that winner prolly wins title.

 

[John Henry]

Go Auburn, beat the Tarheels

 

[FFWhite]

Little has been playing well. Combining him with Cam and Maye gives the Heels a frontline who can put it on the.basket. Ole Roy managed to hide Little all year. Don't know who can match up with Travis.

 

[WildcatNC]

Lay an egg? Aren’t we at or near the top for NCAA winning percentage? And have the second most titles all time? Including 3 titles in the last 23 years, that’s far from laying eggs.

I was talking about the last decade. When you look at the historic talent and teams Cal has had we have under performed, no way to sugar coat it. Have we been good and great at times? Yes. We have also had the best team and went home early to much. It is what it is.

 

[TomTraubertsBlues]

I heard that he could not even keep anything down today. Can't see how he is well enough to play tomorrow.

 

[tankerjoe]

I don't understand why anyone would fear Carolina or Duke. They are both beatable. Same for Virginia and Gonzaga

 

[KingOfBBN]

8 v. 5

And thus why I wanted to avoid them.

 

[-COUNTRY-CLUB-JOE-]

I think you guys have the better team this year. We'll be fortunate to slip past Auburn

 

[minjo]

He gets blocked more than any player I have ever seen.



I think White has been playing better, but to be fair, Hagans isn't really asked to be a scorer. We have Johnson, Herro, and Washington for that.



Flu like symptoms.

Maybe he has flees.:smiley:

 

[Jazzycat]

Gotta beat the Cougars first....they are going to be tough! GBB!

 

[Xception]

I was talking about the last decade. When you look at the historic talent and teams Cal has had we have under performed, no way to sugar coat it. Have we been good and great at times? Yes. We have also had the best team and went home early to much. It is what it is.

We’ve won a title in the last decade, been to four final fours and are above our traditional winning percentage. We’ve had chances but expecting a few titles in a decade is unrealistic. We’ve had some horribly officiated games, we can’t control that.

You’re expecting too much and I wonder what your take was on how many titles we should win when Cal got hired. The vast majority said we couldn’t win a title relying on freshmen, many of those same posters lament we haven’t won enough titles.

 

[nkuCATfan]

I am not taking away anything from Carolina. But......their two best “wins” were against a zionless duke. And duke hasn’t been the same with him back (I think the 1 point loss in acct is overvalued). They beat Florida st at home, close game until they went on a run at the end. They beat Louisville at Louisville when they were blowing leads and losing to everyone. Clemson? Wake forest? Boston college?

I am not in anyway saying they suck, I’m just making the case they didn’t really do anymore than what we did to earn their 1 seed. So are they playing good? Yeah. The last team they played that was a top 3 seed not named duke (also rivalry game so they are just diff) was Virginia. A defensive team. They lost at home.

 

[Catzman]

Late to the party but I would consider PJ and Maye a push and Cam Johnson is definitely better than Keldon. Cam is averaging 17 and 6 while shooting a career high 46% from 3. And I love PJ but he averages 15 and 7.5. Hes definitely had games where hes the best player on the court but he coasts too much. Maye doesnt score the same but is infinitely better at rebounding which is a head scratcher. Id take PJs offense and defense but wish he had Mayes consistency and rebounding.

 

[Kai Slater]

Many in big blue nation fear the UNCheaters because they are fast closing in on us for NCAA championships and they look very good right now. Let's also throw in that they hold a sizable lead on us in head to head matchups and often have the refs in their favor. So, a lot of the fear just comes from the name brand alone.

 

[DeanSmithForever]

UNC March Breakdown:

There are several factors to our improvement:

1. Healthy: Little hurt his foot and was hampered for about a month. However he has been on a tear now that his ankle has healed up (assuming he recovers from his flu like symptoms). Likewise, Leaky Black (who is severely underrated as a passer, shooter, rebounder, and defender) has finally come back after a long absence. This UNC team has especially turned a corner ever since Garrison Brooks has gotten healthy (he played in games, but was dinged pre-ACC regular season) and doesn’t have ankle injuries down low. Now that he is healthy, he is one of the best post defenders we have had in the last 10 years, and gives us legitimate post defense we lacked earlier in the year.

2. Defense: UNC has gotten MUCH better on defense lately, especially on (a) guarding drives, (b) perimeter rotations, and (c) interior defense with Brooks now healthy. We struggled with all three early, but are really clicking now. Coby White and Little are key reasons for the perimeter defensive improvements; Coby has actually even guarded the other team’s best perimeter player for stretches and done fantastic during those times.

3. Passing: No one UNC player dominates on passing, but 1-5 this is one of the best passing UNC teams we have had. This wasn’t true earlier in the year, but it has been the last 1.5 months. A good statistical comparison is the Florida 2006-2007 teams that had good passing across the board. I genuinely don’t know how Cal did against them (if he played them at all) and would be curious to know since our advanced analytic passing numbers the last month matches those Florida teams.

That’s about it. We don’t have any magical surprises up our sleeve and I know other teams have gotten better besides UNC, including a much improved Kentucky team. My personal opinion is UNC will play them closer than the 8 point loss we took to UK in December. My thinking on this is while I know every team deals with injuries (and Kentucky has dealt with a ton), injuries early in the year (not as much late) affect UNC more than other teams because we run both a freelance half-court offense and a freelance secondary break, and they both require an extensive amount of familiarity with teammates. Cal’s teams get better in March because they are young. Roy’s team get better in March because they finally have the teammate familiarity to run our offense, and that gives him time to get the players fully on board on defensive rotations. It has been under the radar, but this year’s UNC team had an inordinate amount of injuries, and my experience watching Roy coached teams has been his teams with multiple players who were injured in the early season make the biggest jumps at the end of the year.

I expect you guys will roll Houston if PJ is healthy enough to play. Hopefully we can escape Auburn for a Blueblood elite eight rubber Match in the Cal/Roy era.

 

[Randy Bob]

Hope Auburn beats UNC all for the SEC teams.

 

[TomTraubertsBlues]

I started to read the post by DSF, then I remembered they have been cheating for many years, and realized I couldn't care less what their fans think.

 

[St.PatterSoN-54-]

I think Auburn beats UNC like a drum tonight, despite the Refs best efforts. I think they'll go up big early, and not look back.

 

[DeanSmithForever]

I for my part wish you all a wonderful day.

 

[WildcatNC]

Lay an egg? Aren’t we at or near the top for NCAA winning percentage? And have the second most titles all time? Including 3 titles in the last 23 years, that’s far from laying eggs.

This was "laying an egg" again. Unless we have a generational type talent (Anthony Davis) we will go home early. Losing to inferior teams is sort of our March MO. I want to be wrong but it is what it is.

 

[Xception]

This was "laying an egg" again. Unless we have a generational type talent (Anthony Davis) we will go home early. Losing to inferior teams is sort of our March MO. I want to be wrong but it is what it is.

So unless we win it all it’s an egg, I don’t think you understand the math involved on the chances of winning it all. Everybody loses in the tournament most of the time, so everybody is laying eggs. You title only fans need to study our history. I said before that we went 36 years with one title, using your logic our history is nothing but a bunch of eggs. Congratulations on needing to lose one game in the tournament to prove your dumbass theory when it takes six wins for you to be wrong. At least you know how to play the odds.

 

[WildcatNC]

So unless we win it all it’s an egg, I don’t think you understand the math involved on the chances of winning it all. Everybody loses in the tournament most of the time, so everybody is laying eggs. You title only fans need to study our history. I said before that we went 36 years with one title, using your logic our history is nothing but a bunch of eggs. Congratulations on needing to lose one game in the tournament to prove your dumbass theory when it takes six wins for you to be wrong. At least you know how to play the odds.

I mean losing to inferior teams constantly. If a great team knocks us out and has equitable talent I get it, it happens. The bracket has opened up for us the past few times and we just let less talented teams take us out. We have a high of a rate of getting kicked in the nuts by lesser teams when we have a major talent advantage.

 

[Xception]

I mean losing to inferior teams constantly. If a great team knocks us out and has equitable talent I get it, it happens. The bracket has opened up for us the past few times and we just let less talented teams take us out. We have a high of a rate of getting kicked in the nuts by lesser teams when we have a major talent advantage.

You’re still not going to win all your games just because you’re the higher seed, go look at some other high seeds that have had far worse records. You expect way too much and seem to willfully ignore the randomness of the tournament in favor of just expecting to win as a higher seed.

Very few teams have had the success we’ve had during Cals tenure and by your formula are also laying eggs. Since everybody is laying eggs then we don’t have a big issue. Look how many eggs Jay Wright has laid or Coach K and Roy Williams have laid as a higher seed during the same time. So who you s not laying eggs using your algorithm?