A STORYBOOK ENDING FOR THESE HEELS
April 9, 2009 by David Im
It’s fair to say no one in the history of college basketball faced the kind of expectations the North Carolina Tar Heels did this season. There was chatter of an undefeated season and how they could be the greatest team in the sport’s history. National championship? That was a given.
Put them in the NBA because no college team could touch the Heels. It was going to be a cakewalk to Detroit and it was never more evident than the first time they played at Ford Field this season against Michigan State – the same Michigan State they throttled Monday night to win their second title in five seasons. In a game few envisioned would be a precursor to the finals, North Carolina won by 35 points and an undefeated season looked possible.
But head coach Roy Williams knew those expectations would be impossible to meet.
“People anointed us before the year that we were going to go undefeated, which I thought was silly at the time,” he said while reflecting upon the second title. “Then we lost two games and everybody jumped off the ship.”
And he was right. After stunning losses to Boston College and Wake Forest to start conference play, the message boards lit up with posts calling for his job and already declaring the season a failure (perhaps the same fans who chided Ty Lawson for testing the NBA draft waters last year). Experts were saying the Heels couldn’t play defense, star Tyler Hansbrough had regressed in his development, and their depth – cut down as a result of multiple injuries – would ultimately keep them from winning a championship.
Even as they won 14 of their next 16 games, the doubts lingered. Lawson’s infamous toe injury forced him to miss the ACC Tournament and UNC was ousted by Florida State in the semifinals. Then Selection Sunday came and the Tar Heels were given a No. 1 seed in the South region. After the field was announced, the Heels were in somewhat of an odd situation as they were both a favorite to win it all as well as a trendy pick to be upset. Amateur and expert bracketologists alike had the enigmatic Gonzaga Bulldogs, the six-overtime winner Syracuse Orange, and the Blake Griffin-led Oklahoma Sooners all taking out the preseason favorite, scenarios that were unheard of in November.
As the NCAA Tournament was set to get under way, word got out that UNC’s lightning-quick point guard would miss the opening round and questions about Lawson’s toughness arose – the same Lawson who carried his team to victory against hated rival Duke just two days after he originally hurt his toe.
The Cousy Award winner watched from the bench as his teammates defeated the Radford Highlanders 101-58. But he quickly and soundly answered his critics in the Heels’ second-round victory against LSU, scoring 21 points in the second-half.
“I’ve kidded the little fella [Lawson], called him Dennis the Menace, and that’s exactly who he is,” Williams said after the LSU game. “But I’ve never seen Dennis the Menace as tough as I saw him today.”
Carolina then breezed by Gonzaga in the Sweet 16, and in a showdown between the last two players of the year — Hansbrough and Griffin — the Heels eliminated the Sooners, earning a return trip to the Final Four. Griffin, the likely No. 1 overall pick, won the head-to-head match-up with Psycho T, but Lawson, Danny Green, and Deon Thompson proved to be too much for Oklahoma to handle.
The Heels returned to the Final Four against Villanova, hoping to make up for their embarrassing showing from a year before when they fell behind Kansas by 28 points, and eventually lost 84-66. Wayne Ellington made sure there wouldn’t be a repeat performance. The Wynnewood, Penn., native caught fire, hitting five of seven three pointers and ended up with 20 points, continuing an impressive run of games where he played like an All-American. Bobby Frasor also pitched in with seven rebounds, including five huge ones on the offensive end that kept the Wildcats from making any kind of run.
After North Carolina easily disposed of Villanova, it then faced its toughest opponent of all: destiny.
Despite easily making its way through the tournament, it seemed as though everyone was getting behind Michigan State. The national media took the destiny angle and ran with it all weekend long. The Spartans were in the championship game for a reason. It was exactly 30 years ago that a young Magic Johnson led MSU to the title against Larry Bird and Indiana State. The Spartans were going to bring back hope for Detroit, which hosted the game amidst a backdrop of economic despair. CBS analysts Greg Anthony and Seth Davis bought into the hype and chose to ignore common basketball logic, both announcing to the millions of television viewers that they’d be picking the Spartans to take down mighty North Carolina.
The Tar Heels would have none of it. They destroyed Michigan State, 89-72, never letting the Spartans, or its 55,000 supporters, into the game.
Michigan State head coach Tom Izzo put it best in a pre-game interview with ESPN, “I’d believe in destiny if we weren’t playing North Carolina.”
Destiny was not meant to be and if it was, the Tar Heels were the ones who were destined to win the championship. After all, their guys came back and collectively had one objective in mind. They played together as a team, putting individual goals aside to achieve a singular one. This unity was never on display more than when they were on defense. Oh, that defense. Pardon the pun, but it was supposed to be Carolina’s Achilles’ Heel; the reason they wouldn’t win the championship. But the team stepped it up when they needed to most, holding their tournament opponents to 38.4% shooting and forcing 15.5 turnovers per game. They forced the Spartans into 21 turnovers and used their much-maligned defense to win the championship Hansbrough, Lawson, Green, and Ellington came back for.
“North Carolina, as I walked off the floor, I told Hansbrough that it was really nice to see a bunch of guys that stayed in school and put winning above everything else,” Izzo later said after the game. “Even though we did have a cause – we had a bunch of causes – they had a cause, too, and I was pretty impressed by that.”
It’s appropriate that Izzo would say that to Hansbrough specifically. One of the greatest players in college basketball history (now validated with a title), Hansbrough is an anomaly in today’s game: a four-year player who passed up on millions of dollars every year he decided to come back to Chapel Hill. Despite his draft stock being at an all-time high last year, he came back, partly to win a national championship and mainly to be a kid for another year. So with all due respect to all the other student-athletes, if there was one player who deserved to win a title, it was Hansbrough. It was touching to see him celebrate his championship with the same passion that fueled his game.
“If you put $10 million in a pile right there, and tell me ‘you can have it. But if you take it, you’ll forget that feeling when that big rascal came over and hugged you,’ you guys can split that 10 million because I wouldn’t take it,” Williams said at the post-game news conference.
But this year’s team wasn’t just about Hansbrough like it may have been a year before. It was also about Ellington, the Most Outstanding Player of the Final Four and most emotional of the bunch during the post-game celebration. It was about Dancin’ Danny Green, the winningest player in Carolina history. Bobby Frasor, who lost his starting gig when Lawson came into town, suffered injury after injury and ended up being only a shadow of his former self. The rising superstar Ed Davis who may end up being the best pro on the team. The oft-criticized Deon Thompson, who many thought should have been replaced by Davis in the starting lineup, came up big in the tournament. Larry Drew, the future point guard who will be handed the keys to the Tar Heels’ engine in a year. Tyler Zeller, who gave up a year of eligibility after coming back from a broken wrist suffered early in the year, just to be a part of this special group. Even Marcus Ginyard, the defensive specialist and senior who was supposed to go out with Hansbrough and Co., but instead will finish his career next year after playing in only three games because of a foot injury. Don’t forget Mike Copeland, Justin Watts, and the walk-ons who didn’t get much playing time, but busted their tails all season long in practice. And finally Ty Lawson, the ACC Player of the Year and owner of the most scrutinized toe in tournament history. He’s the reason UNC won the title and despite Ellington winning the MOP, everyone will remember Lawson as the best and most important player on this team.
So maybe it wasn’t quite the storybook ending the nation was looking for, but the Tar Heels wouldn’t have written their story any other way. And after a year which saw six different teams reach No. 1, a North Carolina championship was a fitting conclusion to a college basketball season that started and ended with the Heels on top.
my favorite tar heel team of all time
unc sucks. duke rules.