UNC's March begins: five things the Tar Heels must improve in the tournament

The NCAA tournament has already tipped off, and North Carolina begins its quest for a sixth NCAA title tonight at 7:15 against Long Island. While UNC has won nine of its previous 10 games, a few of those games have shown chinks in the Tar Heel armor. If UNC wants to make a deep run into the NCAA tournament, the Tar Heels must work on:

Beating a zone defense

At no point during this year has North Carolina been able to figure out how to beat a zone defense. This has long been known by Tar Heel opponents. Most teams usually throw a traditional 2-3 at UNC because the Tar Heels have a tough time breaking through to the interior. In February, UNC embarrassed Boston College 106-74 in Chestnut Hill. The Eagles ran a zone defense against the Tar Heels in the rematch and held UNC to a season-low 48 points.

UNC has combated the zone defense with increased 3-point efficiency. Harrison Barnes is shooting 46.8 percent from behind the arc in the past five games while Leslie McDonald is 52.9 percent in that same span.

Freeing Kendall Marshall when he brings the ball down the floor

Roy Williams knows its tough for his offense to get into a flow when it has to start 45 feet from the basket, but that’s what opponents have forced Kendall Marshall and the Tar Heels to do. Clemson’s Demontez Stitt applied soft pressure when Marshall brought the ball up the court, but Duke’s Nolan Smith crouched down even lower with his hand extended to always present the threat of a potential swipe.

Marshall is an old-school point guard who always handles the ball with his head up looking for not only where he’s going to pass, but where that next pass may end up. When Stitt, Smith or any other guard forces Marshall to focus less on UNC’s offensive set and more on just getting the ball past the timeline, the Tar Heels struggle to get their offense going the way it should.

Shaky starts

In three ACC tournament games, North Carolina started sluggishly. And in the final game against Duke, it finally caught up with the Tar Heels. No UNC player will say he got tired of having to come back because three games in three days is the nature of tournament basketball. North Carolina’s opponents in the ACC tournament averaged a .530 shooting percentage from the field in the first half. UNC, on the other hand, averaged .332 from the field in the first 20 minutes.

Williams says if he knew what was wrong, he’d fix it. We’ll see how good he is at diagnosing the problem tonight.

Letting Tyler Zeller get roughed up

Zeller’s the tallest and heaviest guy UNC has, but opponents have been throwing him around in the paint. Coaches are putting players in just to bang with Zeller. FSU coach Leonard Hamilton had Jon Kreft tangle with him, and Kreft picked up four fouls. Former N.C. State coach Sidney Lowe had Jordan Vandenberg hassle Zeller, and he was hit with four fouls. After Vandenberg’s first two fouls, Lowe made it a point to clap for his guy following the game plan.

Zeller’s not gaining 35 pounds of muscle in a week, but getting banged around on offense isn’t doing wonders for his stat line. He averages 14.5 points per game, but in the two contests mentioned above he had 20 points combined.

Getting into foul trouble

Since May, Williams has lost the Wear twins, Will Graves, Larry Drew II and Reggie Bullock. The coach could have a 13-man rotation in theory, but instead he’s working with eight guys. The shallowness of UNC’s roster means the Tar Heels can’t get into foul trouble. Starting 2-guard Dexter Strickland racked up three quick fouls and finished with four, playing only 21 minutes against Duke while Nolan Smith ran roughshod on UNC’s defense.

UNC averages nearly four fewer fouls than its opponents, but other teams can afford to hack the Tar Heels.