North Carolina and Duke are doing fine, thanks

Sporting News, The, Dec 18, 1995 by Mike DeCourcy

For the North Carolina Tar Heels, that trip into college basketball's nether-world was treacherous and terrifying, so they're grateful to be back among the elite. How long was it they were gone, anyway? Six months? Yeah, the world was a different place in those days.

The Heels reached the Final Four last season and are back in the Top 15 now, but it was some offseason. After Coach Dean Smith's team lost All-America sophomores Jerry Stackhouse, and Rasheed Wallace to the NBA Draft, a lot of people who should have known better suggested we'd be rid of Carolina of long while.

"Highly vulnerable," claimed one preseason basketball publication. "Serious patchwork in the Deandome," said another. "The kind of talent void on the Tar Heels roster that hadn't existed for a long, long time," said a third. "No. 13," said The Sporting News College Basketball Yearbook.

OK, so we're gloating.

"They're not as deep as the normal North Carolina teams; they're not as refined as the normal North Carolina teams," says Michigan State Coach Tom Izzo, whose Spartans were stomped by the Heels in the Maui Invitational. "What's not great talent for North Carolina is still better than a lot of teams they'll play."

Check out these facts, with no names attached, and consider whether this team should have been so easily dismissed: four McDonald's All-Americans, two of the nation's 10 best recruits, the college game's deadliest 3-point shooter, a capable, veteran point guard, a 7-foot-2 center and a coach who has won more than 800 games.

There may be little margin for error because the rotation runs eight deep, but it is plausible to suggest a lot of people wanted Carolina out of the picture after years of dominance, so they closed their eves and wished. Same thing for Duke, the Tar Heels' bitterest ACC rival, which fell to 13-18 last season after Coach Mike Krzyzewski took his leave of absence after 12 games. Even with Coach K returning and plenty of talent in tow, Duke shocked a lot of people by winning the Great Alaska Shootout.

"I think what happened is the national media, and even the local media, went a little crazy with, `Joe Smith is gone, Stackhouse is gone, Wallace is, gone,

Duke had a bad year and lost its inside players, "Wake Forest Coach Dave Odom says. "I think coaches know, and the players in his league know, when one door closes another opens."

Reasonable concerns about Carolina's fitness were alleviated when Smith started 6-8 freshman Antawn Jamison at power forward, ahead of ground-bound junior Ed Geth. Jamison's most obvious gift is for operating in traffic - finishing, snatching rebounds that seem committed to others - and that translated easily to the college level. Jamison is just shy of averaging a double-double.

Point guard Jeff McInnis is playing the position as well as anyone, breaking down the defense with penetration and shooting OK from long range. Dante Calabria, the one senior, still is hitting 50 percent on 3-pointers. As much as people laugh at junior center Serge Zwikker, and as heavily as he relies on his height to accomplish everything, he has a sweet jump hook and a decent baseline jumper.

In the preseason, Smith fretted about the absence of upperclassmen among the Tar Heels, but his experience with Stackhouse and Wallace demonstrates the sport has changed. Seniors are a luxury, not a necessity, and he has got wins over quality teams like Vanderbilt, Tulane and Stanford to prove it.

As for Duke, the Blue Devils have been beaten up twice by physical Big Ten teams (excuse the redundancy), but among ACC teams, only Virginia can bump-and-grind with Michigan and Illinois. The schedule softens before league play begins, meaning Krzyzewski has time to mold one reliable big man out of Greg Newton and freshman Taymon Domzalski. And maybe he can persuade guard Jeff Capel to pass the ball.

Guard Trajan Langdon's leg stress fracture will cost him the season, but senior Chris Collins is playing bette. He has recovered his shooting touch and discovered a gift for slashing through the lane.

"If there were any thoughts in our players' minds that those teams weren't going to be any good," Odom says of Carolina and Duke, "that's gone. I think you're going to see an extraordinarily hard-fought conterence race."

Road show

There is no football team at Wright State, but that's not preventing the Raiders from making a bowl trip.

Their basketball team was scheduled to visit Virginia Tech on December 31, but most of Blacksburg will be in New Orleans that day for the Sugar Bowl. So the Tech-Wright State basketball game will be there, as well.

The Hokies will play their "home" game against the Raiders at 11 a.m. CST in UNO's Lakefront Arena, with the Sugar Bowl against Texas following at the Superdome at 6:30 p.m.

Tech's fans are so committed, Athletic Director Dave Braine expects 25,000 to attend the Sugar Bowl, so there may not be enough seats in the 10,000-capacity Lakefront to accommodate everyone interested.

The Hokies are picking up Wright State's extra travel costs, made necessary by the change in plans. The Raiders get to enjoy, New Orleans rather than the hassle of visiting isolated Blacksburg in the dead of winter.