It wasn't a perfect game by Wake Forest, but a win is a win and by beating Miami 62-53, the Deacs move into third place at 5-3 and 16-5 overall.
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Nobody shot well for either team - Chas McFarland was 3-5, but that was about it - and they combined for 34 turnovers. Miami did manage to hold Al-Farouq Aminu to six points, but all in all, this game was nothing to write home about other than solid defense.
It's been a pretty unpredictable season, and while Duke has stayed at or near the top to date, UNC is in tenth place, something to which they are definitely not accustomed. And it's getting to Roy Williams.
While Williams has generally accepted the blame for things, he's also made it clear that, well, his shtick has worked before, so...not really my fault, if you take my point.
He also said that he wasn't concerned about cliques developing on the team, but finger pointing may be. Deon Thompson said this to the Herald-Sun:
"'Guys just need to care more. "[They] just need to care more about this jersey, the name that we wear on the front of our chest. It just means so much in the history, and it represents so much, and we're just not representing Carolina basketball that way right now.'
"He added that he and fellow senior Marcus Ginyard have tried to take on leadership roles to rally the team, 'but guys have to respond. Even if you get mad, it's still up to them to respond to what you say. So it's a two-way street.'"
Caulton Tudor points out that UNC will have to go .500 in their last 10 games just to get to 7-9. So here's what they have left: Virginia Tech and Maryland (road games), Duke and State (home), Georgia Tech and B.C. (road), Florida State (home) Wake (road), Miami (home) and Duke (road). At this point, we'd pick UNC to beat State and Miami and maybe B.C. Duke-UNC is always a toss-up emotionally no matter how either team is performing, so set those aside. The rest? Hard to say. The talent is still there, but the lessons have to be learned, as Ol' Roy rightly says. But he's the teacher.
Here's more on the concerns about scheduling and quick turnaround games. Duke gets hit this week with Georgia Tech on Thursday and B.C. on Saturday.
Speaking of B.C., here's an article on Jared Dudley, who despite being not particularly athletic continues to astound people by making himself key to his teams.
State has a date with Virginia and El Sid may choose to limit Javi Gonzalez's play for disciplinary reasons. It's going to be interesting to see how Virginia does as they start to see teams for the second time.
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