After watching the Maryland-UNC game, which Maryland won 92-71, there are some things that are pretty clear about both teams.
First, Maryland is the most coherent team in the ACC at this point. They understand their roles very well, they're athletic, and they play together as well as any team we've seen this season. At this point, they have to, at the least, be considered no worse than the co-favorites to take the regular season.
Second, UNC has some serious problems. Among them are ballhandling/decision making and defense.
UNC turned the ball over 14 times, but there's no stat available for bobbles or momentum broken, and that happened a lot. On one first half break, Marcus Ginyard bobbled the dribble and then threw the pass away.
Larry Drew on one occasion was on a break of his own and dribbled up next to a defender - there goes the ball!
There were any number of times that things like this happened with the ballhandling or clumsy, ill-considered passes. Yet as bad as that was, the defense may have been worse, and one of the biggest offenders here was Will Graves. Once -- right in front of Roy Williams no less - he bit on a fake towards half-court and went left while his man headed to the basket. On another, on the opposite side of the court, his man started to go around a screen towards the basket - then stepped back behind the three point line. By the time Graves realized it, his man was all alone and hit a three.
To his credit, on both occasions he got the points back on the other end. But still, it was pretty egregious.
Also quite egregious was the awful defense by one of the Wear twins in the second half: with Greivis Vasquez taking the ball out under the basket, he took his eyes off of his man - who promptly dunked in his face.
Needless to say, Maryland was more than happy to capitalize and did so with glee. They're off until Wednesday, when they get Virginia - assuming that the roads are passable enough, that is.
Down in Tallahassee, despite great resistance from former President T.K. Wetherell, who left his post a few days ago, Florida State has accepted the NCAA's penalty for academic fraud and has vacated 12 football wins and a national track title. The entire 2006-07 basketball season is also wiped out, meaning FSU officially finished 0-35
- Fresh air coming to FSU? New president arrives as cheating scandal ends
- FSU's Academic Fraud Scandal Finally Comes To A Close
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