Tar Heels struggling to score

With 22 seconds remaining and North Carolina trailing Virginia Tech by four, Will Graves pulled up and fired. The shot looked good in the air, rattled around the basket and finally rolled — out.

UNC went on to lose, 74-70.

The final score was on par with the Tar Heels’ ACC scoring average for the season.

It’s a low for the Roy Williams era at UNC. In six seasons before 2009-10, Williams’ UNC teams averaged almost 87 points per game in ACC play.

Gone are the fast-break points, the layup-line offensive production, the quick runs that characterized recent Tar Heel teams.

Williams’ vaunted secondary break system is tailored to produce easy buckets. But the Tar Heels haven’t topped 80 points in 2010 and don’t have a player averaging more than 15 points.

And the next opponent is Duke, a good defense team that’s hungering for a win against UNC (13-10, 2-6 ACC).

The offensive malaise starts — and ends — in the post.

Great big men characterize Roy Williams’ UNC teams. First there was Sean May and Jawad Williams, then Tyler Hansbrough and Brandan Wright, then Hansbrough and Deon Thompson.

All are college forwards who could run the floor and collect those easy buckets from the quick setup.

The 2009-10 team looked similar last October. There was Ed Davis and Thompson, both capable of running the floor. Thompson could score, and Davis could crash the boards and power home dunks.

For the season, the two both average around 14 points per game, but in ACC play, the two only put up around 11 points per game each.

“That makes it that much more frustrating when you see how good things can be,” Marcus Ginyard said. “To not play like that all the time, it makes that a little more disappointing.”

The team has taken plenty of heat as losses piled up, and Thompson said it’s gotten so bad that he orders food under a different name and even hides his face under a hood so people don’t know it’s him.

“It’s just hard to be around people when you’re losing,” Thompson said. “It’s just really hard for me personally.”

It hasn’t helped that Tyler Zeller and his 9.6 points per game went down with an injury at the start of the ACC season.

UNC’s lack of a perimeter scorer hurts as well, and without much experience in the backcourt, it is third to last in the ACC in turnovers.

The lack of development from the freshman class hurts as well.

“My hope was that our depth up front would be able to balance some of that out,” Williams said. “I think people would agree that our depth hasn’t been what we thought it would be.”

Perhaps expectations were too high after 2006, when UNC shocked everyone with a bunch of freshmen. Perhaps the Tar Heels believed their own hype and top-10 preseason ranking a little too much.

But for whatever reason, points aren’t coming anymore, and all that’s left is the last half of an ACC season that’s been forgettable thus far.



Contact the Sports Editor at sports@unc.edu.