Looking Back: Barnes Made the Right Call

From my Twitter timeline (at @thedevilwolf, by the way) …

MattLewis8281: “I have a what if for you, what if harrison barnes had signed with duke?….”

Great question, Matt.  It may surprise a lot of people for me to say that I think, ultimately, Harrison Barnes made the right call to Skype UNC coach Roy Williams.  And no this isn’t going to be one of those message-board-like posts where I irrationally devalue Barnes as a player, or I downplay how badly Duke wanted him on their roster … Barnes is a talented player, and Duke would have been better with Barnes on their team.  Additionally, UNC would have been a lot worse without Barnes in light blue.  No, I’m not even going to discuss the fake persona that Barnes has tricked everyone into taking at face value.  I’m going to keep it to basketball, and I’m going to keep it to business.  When talking Harrison Barnes, you can’t separate the two.

First, let’s talk basketball.  At the beginning of the season, it was clear to me that Harrison Barnes was in the wrong offense.  He wasn’t being put in good positions to take quality shots, and he seemed to be receiving mixed messages from his coach as to how Barnes fit into the Tarheel program.  Regardless of the reason, Barnes struggled to find his way through the first half of the season, and it was easy to defend a claim that a talented wing player would have been better off in Coach K’s system. 

As the season went on, it became more and more clear that Barnes needed to be more involved in the attack.  When Kendall Marshall took over for Larry Drew II, the change seemed to ignite Barnes because he not only had a point guard who wanted the offense to run through Barnes, he had a fellow freshman leading the way which make it “okay” for Barnes to take on more of a leadership role.  Barnes was at his best when he was getting shots.  Barnes attempted 497 shots on the season, 113 more shots that Tyler Zeller who had the second most shots on the team.  By comparison, Nolan Smith and Kyle Singler, the senior leaders for the Blue Devils, combined to average 538.5 shots between them.  Seth Curry finished third in shots attempted with 239.  For argument’s sake, let’s assume that all of Curry’s shots go to Barnes.  His 42% shooting would only have yielded 100 made field goals on the season, which would have been 110 less made field goals than he made this season at UNC.  Yes, that math is incredibly flawed, but it does go to show that Nolan Smith and Kyle Singler were getting their shots regardless of who was around them.  Harrison Barnes would not have had the chance to jack up nearly 500 shots his freshman season.  If Kyrie Irving had played a full season, his 9.5 shots per game would have only given him 350 shots on the season.  Another comparison, Barnes attempted two more shots during his freshman year than JJ Redick attempted his Junior season, and Redick attempted 26% of Duke’s shots that year.

Timing is everything, and if Barnes was in the class of 2011 and had the decision to make all over again, no question Duke would be the place for him as a wing who needs a lot of shots to be effective offensively.  Hell, if Singler had jumped to the NBA, a good portion of those 509 shots that Kyle took this past season would have been looks for Barnes.  But as mentioned before, the decision Barnes made was one part basketball and three parts business. 

Let’s assume for a moment that Barnes has the exact same arc to his season at Duke than he had at UNC.  Show of hands for everyone who thinks for one second that a struggling Barnes, the first player in college basketball history to be named pre-season first team All-American, would have received the “what if Harrison Barnes made one more shot a game” treatment.  Yes, I know you’re reading a blog and nobody can see you raising your hand, but it’s not like anyone would honestly think his treatment would have been equitable if he’d chosen Duke.  Barnes would have been, hands down, the most hated basketball player in America.  That might be the brand that Austin Rivers wants to build for himself, but it sure as hell is not what Barnes was going for.  At UNC, Barnes is thoughtful, mature, calculated, the second-most introspective man in the world behind his coach.  At Duke, he’d be smug, arrogant, stand-offish … he’d be the guy Jalen Rose would be pointing to as supporting evidence of his ignorant opinion of Duke.  Even worse for Barnes, he might not even have had the opportunity to perpetuate his “Black Falcon” character because Duke guys live in the spotlight at all times.  From ESPN behind-the-scenes specials to dukeblueplanet.com videos, Duke is making an effort to humanize the program by showing off the huge personalities of the players.  In that admittedly entertaining and awesome behind-the-scenes video of UNC in Newark, Barnes comes off as being awkward and a bit of an outcast among his teammates who come off as the kind of guys you’d love to hang out with.  Guys who are in tune with public relations, which Barnes definitely is, are more comfortable controlling their message rather than allowing the public to see the unedited, raw person behind the mask.  Barnes would have been out of his element in so many ways on last year’s Duke team. 

Duke isn’t for everyone, which is why so many fall into the category of being “Duke haters”.  To survive Duke, a kid needs to have thick skin, self-confidence, the ability to trust those around him, and an understanding of their place in the program, or at the very least, a desire to gain that understanding.  Duke kids don’t call up reporters seeking personal validation by checking their All-American status.  Duke kids don’t (allegedly) make power plays behind the scenes on their coaching staff to force their input on who should play and who shouldn’t play.  Duke kids don’t wear self-made t-shirts with their self-given nicknames, or have their parents print up posters of their dunks.  Because they’re better people?  Well, I can’t answer that without being an asshole myself.  But definitely because they’re not allowed to.  Not by Coach K, and not by the media.  Let’s be honest, Harrison Barnes would have been SKEWERED by the media this season had he gone to Duke.  And if Coach K had fired back with Roy’s “Leave Harrison Alone” blast, it only would have gotten worse.  Again, Duke is not for everyone.  It sure as hell was not the place for Harrison Barnes.

Interestingly enough, I think he’s the ONLY player on either roster who isn’t hypothetically interchangeable.  Kyrie would have thrived at UNC just like he did at Duke.  Kendall Marshall would have thrived at Duke just like he did at UNC.  Same with Smith, Singler, Zeller, Henson, and so on.  But Barnes needed the buffer from the hate and criticism that the light blue blanket seems to provide in these parts.  He made the right call.  And he surely wouldn’t have fit in with the Kansas Jailhawks.

Harrison Barnes: The Prestige

Last month, I wrote a piece on Harrison Barnes and his “decision” to join the NBA or to return to North Carolina for his sophomore season.  In the post, I presented the theory that the decision had been made well in advance, it was just a matter of timing to build suspense and intrigue around his announcement to return.  From the comments section, it was clear how UNC fans felt about my spot-on analysis of their manufactured hero …

“I can’t believe you guys are STILL obsessed with Barnes. The more you talk about him the more power he has over you and your fan base. Real talk, let it go.”

“You are just a bitter duke fan, you need to get over it, every kid plays the same game including all the players that have gone to duke. cry me a river.”

“Lets face facts, you’re mad because Barnes chose UNC over Duke and right now Duke’s future doesn’t look terribly bright.”

Let’s put an end to this foolishness right now, Tarheels.  To do so, I’m going to paraphrase the great Aaron Sorkin’s brilliant screen play from “The Social Network” to summarize my feelings about him.  Harrison Barnes is probably going to go through life thinking that a lot of people don’t like him because he’s a Tarheel.  I want him to know, from the bottom of my heart, that won’t be true.  It will be because he’s an asshole.

Jim Young from The ACC Sports Journal, and one of my favorite bloggers out there, posted his thoughts on the Barnes’ announcement and included the following statement:

When John Henson and Tyler Zeller announced their plans to return, but Barnes had still not given any word about his decision, the cynics came out in full force.  Their line of thinking: Barnes already knows what he wants to do, but he’s going to string this thing out so he can create maximum drama and exposure.  That theory falls apart, though, when you consider that this announcement was done with very little fanfare, via a Monday morning press release.

Jim’s absolutely right, there was no production, no “fanfare”.  But what was he going to do?  Pack 17,000 fans into Kenan stadium and shock everyone by announcing his return on the big screen?  Who does that???  No, it wasn’t about the method of delivery, Jim.  It’s about the timing.  Not one response to Zeller and Henson’s announcement went published without its own paragraph dedicated to Harrison Barnes.  Even though it was always a foregone conclusion that Barnes would return with his two teammates, there was nothing to be gained by being one-third of the returning group.  To milk every last drop from this announcement, Tarheel fans needed to doubt him. 

Late last week on InsideCarolina.com’s premium forums, the respected “insiders” were all hinting towards a change of heart from Barnes that would lead him to choose NBA riches over his Tarheel legacy.  Dennis Marshall, Kendall Marshall’s father and message-board legend wannabe, joined the act by tweeting “Just heard something a little while ago that numbed me. I once heard a famous phrase…”money talks”. True statement.”  As with all posts from Twitter, Marshall’s tweet may have not had anything to do with Barnes’ announcement, but judging from his childish involvement with message board hijinx in the past and coupled with the timing of these “bombs” being dropped to subscribers of InsideCarolina.com, it just makes all too much sense.  False information was being leaked to UNC fans, or perhaps even to UNC “insiders” to perpetuate the facade that Barnes was suffering through this difficult decision.  There was no romance involved in Zeller and Henson’s announcement.  With Barnes, it had to be another chapter in his legend. 

I’ll break down exactly what happened with Barnes by using another one of my favorite films of all time, Christopher Nolan’s “The Prestige”, as told through one of the most important speeches in the movie:

Every great magic trick consists of three parts or acts. The first part is called “The Pledge”. The magician shows you something ordinary: a deck of cards, a bird or a man. He shows you this object. Perhaps he asks you to inspect it to see if it is indeed real, unaltered, normal. But of course… it probably isn’t. The second act is called “The Turn”. The magician takes the ordinary something and makes it do something extraordinary. Now you’re looking for the secret… but you won’t find it, because of course you’re not really looking. You don’t really want to know. You want to be fooled. But you wouldn’t clap yet. Because making something disappear isn’t enough; you have to bring it back. That’s why every magic trick has a third act, the hardest part, the part we call “The Prestige”.

The Pledge:

Harrison Barnes will play in the NBA someday, and will likely be a very good player in the league.  Harrison Barnes is also a very smart, business savvy young man.  That “someday” is not the 2011-12 season as Harrison has aspects of his game that need improvement before going against better competition than he’s facing at UNC, and his brand is certainly not going to flourish in an empty gym somewhere while the NBA season is on hold for the lockout.  The decision itself was a no-brainer.  The best place for Harrison Barnes was going to be at UNC next year.  But where’s the show?  Where’s the drama?  Where is the talk of building a legacy?  And that takes us to …

The Turn:

“Wait, why didn’t Harrison just announce he’s coming back?  His teammates just did, and they had the exact same decision to make.  I thought he was definitely coming back.  It makes sense for him to come back, right?”  Doubt begins to creep in a bit.  Pre-season rankings start being tossed about by the pundits with Kentucky as a sure-fire #1 team … unless Harrison Barnes returns to UNC, that is.  Some anxiety begins to creep in among the Tarheel faithful.  “He HAS to come back, we’re a lock for the title if he comes back.  Why isn’t he just coming back?”  More doubt.  More anxiety.  InsideCarolina.com starts reporting that he’s deciding to leave for the NBA.  Sources who were once sure that Barnes was returning saw their deadlines for an announcement come and go.  The only official word coming from the UNC Basketball Banquet is from Shirley Barnes saying that Harrison was still agonizing over his decision.  And Shirley Barnes is always honest, right?  No announcement the Friday following the banquet, InsideCarolina.com message board insiders are confirming Barnes is gone, and Dennis Marshall hammers out a disgusted tweet, “money talks”.  He’s going to the NBA.

The Prestige:

Barnes announces that he’s returning to school for his sophomore year.  Now, FINALLY, we can label the Tarheels as early favorites to win the NCAA championship.  FINALLY we can talk about Barnes and his legacy at UNC.  FINALLY we can talk about how mature Barnes is, and how great this is for the college game.  In the classic style of all great fish-tales, we can talk of how Barnes turned down the #1 pick in the NBA draft to return to UNC, completely ignoring/forgetting that he wasn’t ever going to be the first pick.  All of the stories and blogs and tweets we’ve been saving for the past three weeks can FINALLY be distributed to the masses.  The wait is over.  Thank you, Harrison Barnes.  Thank you for coming back next year.  In the end it was his love for UNC that won out over his dream of playing in the NBA.  Barnes continues to follow in the footsteps of his hero, Michael Jordan.  It’s all so clear now, bravo, Mr. Barnes.

Excuse me for not applauding.  I know what’s behind the curtain.

Irving, Barnes Have Tough Decisions to Make

It’s officially hand-wringing season for the majority of college basketball fans… the month-or-so between your favorite team’s last game and the deadline to declare for the NBA draft.  It’s the time of year that controls how a fan views the off-season.  Will you be in a deep depression, sitting silently by yourself looking down at the replica jersey of your favorite early-entry defection trying to remember the good times you had watching them play while not wanting to imagine how life can go on without them?  Or will you be celebrating the return of your team’s savior by saving a place on the wall to add one more framed national championship Sports Illustrated cover next April?  It’s the Groundhog Day of college basketball … if your superstar underclassman sees his NBA shadow and is frightened back into his dorm room for another year, it means two more weeks of car flags flying proudly around town.  Despite the fact that there are as many champions who lost key players to the draft the previous year as there are champions who returned all of their superstars, it’s one of the most intriguing times of year for all fans.

In this area, there are five key figures to keep an eye on … Kyrie Irving and Mason Plumlee from Duke, and Harrison Barnes, John Henson and Tyler Zeller from UNC.  At this moment, the general consensus is that Kyrie has finished his collegiate career, Mason Plumlee is undecided, and the entire trio of Tarheels will return for 2011-12.  Also at this moment, no one outside of those five individuals, their families and their coaches have any idea what they’re going to do – and potentially they don’t know either.  The news on Irving stems from one person, ESPN’s Chad Ford.  Ford stated in an ESPN insider article that Irving was “one foot out of the door” while Mason Plumlee was “50/50”.  The context of the article was Ford’s opinion, and was not based on any conversations he’d had with the players themselves.  Since then, CBS, Yahoo, and numerous mainstream blogs have picked up the story with “ESPN reporting that Irving is going pro” as the backbone of their articles.  This, in a nutshell, is how journalists cover this time of year. 

On the UNC side of things, the story gets a little more humorous.  Apparently the rumors of Zeller, Barnes and Henson’s package decision to return stems from a report from a student who claims to have been at Tyler Zeller’s apartment when Barnes and Henson came over to hang out.  Allegedly, Henson said “It’s time to talk about this decision, bra” and the three retired to Zeller’s bedroom to talk things over.  Unfortunately, we don’t have any more information because the storyteller “couldn’t hear too well because they were in Tyler’s room”, which led to him lamenting over what could have been when he said “I could have been an IC (www.insidecarolina.com) legend.”  Unfortunately, we will not be getting any further information out of the Chi O’s this weekend as they’ve asked their sorority sisters not to ask Kendall Marshall, Harrison Barnes and John Henson about their NBA plans at their formal this weekend.  This leads to another bit of speculation to ponder … why was Tyler Zeller not invited to the party?

Having said all of that, it’s my OPINION that Kyrie Irving will declare for the NBA draft, and that Plumlee, Barnes, Zeller and Henson will all return next season.  I will further clarify by stating that my OPINION is based entirely on the OPINIONS of others.  Cue the Duke fans freaking out about having Kyrie Irving for 11 games while Roy Williams was able to swindle money from Ty Lawson and Raymond Felton by hotboxing them into staying for three seasons, and cue the rosterbation from UNC fans looking through a lineup of 11 NBA players and planning their celebration of their 6th or 7th title (depending on which Tarheel fan you talk to).  As the decisions start being made public, two more hilarious items from this silly-season rear their ugly heads: the overnight change in player evaluation from fans, and the onslaught of early entry rule ideas.

So here’s how this is going to play out … if you ask a UNC fan today to evaluate Harrison Barnes, he’s a poor man’s Sean Elliot who needs to stay in college to become more than just a jumpshooter.  Duke fans think he’s a dynamic talent who should be a top 3 pick and would be absolutely foolish not to go take his place as the next Kevin Durant.  UNC fans feel like Kyrie Irving is the next Derrick Rose, while Duke fans have concerns about how Kyrie will hold up over an NBA season being so small and so out of shape from not playing.  If Barnes comes back, UNC fans are already polishing his Naismith Trophy while Duke fans are taking bets to see who from Roy Williams’ deep bench will transfer first.  Likewise if Irving returns, UNC fans become immediately concerned about Austin Rivers being able to get enough touches to make him happy while Duke fans are writing blog posts about the greatest backcourts in basketball history (coming to this site soon should Kyrie come back to Duke).  It’s the hilarious dance that fans do during this time of year.

And don’t get me started on the early entry opinions that will be thrown around ad nauseam following the conclusion of the championship game.  From the “baseball model” to the “hockey model” to the LeBron/Howard/Garnett model … ideas will be thrown around left and right.  Most of them not even feasible, all of them entirely uninformed and extremely biased.  The only fact you need to know about the early entry debate is this … it’s the NBA’s decision to make, and the decision will ALWAYS be what’s in the best interest of the NBA.  Talk all you’d like about how one-and-dones kill college basketball, or how “high school straight to the NBA” detracts young athletes from pursuing education.  It doesn’t matter.

Personally, I want to see as many kids stay for four years as possible because I like college basketball.  Specifically this season when the NBA is facing a likely work-stoppage, this could be college basketball’s time to shine.  If every underclassmen returned to school for the 2011-12 college season, you’d likely see three of the best teams ever assembled with the talent that Kentucky, UNC and Duke would have on their rosters.  The depth of talent would be legendary.  The worst part about college basketball these days is that we know the above scenario would never play out with all of those players returning.  The best part about college basketball these days … if it DID happen, it wouldn’t be shocking in the slightest if the championship was won by someone other than those three powerhouses.  So while you’re sitting on the edge of your seats over the next few weeks, living and dying with every rumor that gets posted, just remember the games still have to be played next year.  And for every ‘super-team’ that’s ever won a championship, there are two or three champions who came from nowhere to win.

The DevilWolf vs. The Black Falcon

If you’re short for time, I’m going to give you the quick summary of the following post in two short statements.  Harrison Barnes is an elite basketball talent.  He is also a fake.  A phony.  A comic book superhero whose story starts with a tear-jerking, inspirational Nike commercial celebrating the end of his famed career and works its way backwards to present day allowing Harrison to follow his plot line-by-contrived-line.  The hero’s name … The Black Falcon.  Or more accurately, The Black Fugazy.

During the Fall of his senior year at Ames High School, Harrison Barnes conducted one of the most intriguing recruiting sagas in college basketball history.  It had everything … the methodical creation of the Harrison Barnes persona, carefully crafted statements and deliberately placed false clues, twists and turns that are typically reserved for top football recruits to orchestrate their signing day spectacle.  Each word, each action, entirely premeditated.  Let’s be honest here, Duke, UNC, Kansas and Iowa State were never recruiting Harrison Barnes.  Harrison Barnes was recruiting all of us.

From both perspectives, Barnes was not the most important recruit for Duke or for UNC.  Roy Williams had collected enough front-court talent to not only survive the package-deal transfer of the Wear twins, but to provide his Tarheels with a legitimate strength against each and every opponent UNC faced this season.  At Duke, Mike Krzyzewski was returning Nolan Smith but likely losing Kyle Singler to the NBA, but had the depth at the wing position to fill Singler’s shoes with productive minutes from transfer Seth Curry and a Sophomore Andre Dawkins.  Both teams were in dire need of a point guard as Roy Williams was never able to fill the void left behind by Ty Lawson, and Duke had been running a two-year point guard by committee.  Looking from strictly a need-based viewpoint, Kendall Marshall and Kyrie Irving were the two most important pieces to the Duke & UNC puzzles.

But there sat Barnes, the #1 overall recruit in the entire class.  Widely considered to be a Duke lock, fans were touting Barnes as the next Shane Battier … the guy who was going to bring Duke back to the top of the college basketball mountain.  Roy Williams’ Tarheels were already perched atop that peak coming off of their 2008-09 NCAA championship, and Barnes was being talked about by UNC fans as a “luxury recruit”.  Perception said that Duke needed Barnes in the worst way to even have a chance to compete with UNC.  The recruiting stories were legendary, and what’s true and what’s fake at this point is both impossible to determine and completely irrelevant.  From stories of Barnes throwing a UNC t-shirt into a trashcan to him sneaking off to call Roy Williams from the bathroom while on his official visit to Duke, the fish tales were coming fast and furious.  Allegedly Barnes told K during the last in home visit “Save #40 for me, Coach”, and then later that night posed for pictures with Roy Williams in his UNC #40 jersey during a secret in home visit.  There was the famous story of the waiter in Chapel Hill who witnessed Coach K get a phone call from Harrison before hanging up in anger.  No one knew if any of this was ever real, but when a reporter asked Harrison Barnes what he thought of the stories, he broke character for a brief second to show us his laugh as if to say “I have all of you exactly where I want you.”

Harrison wasn’t picking a school based on basketball.  He said as much in his press conference as he spoke of building his brand.  Which team was it going to be in that Nike commercial 20 years from now?  Kansas?  The birthplace of college basketball?  Duke?  The model program and America’s “bad guy”?  Or North Carolina.  The house that Jordan built.  Which was going to be the best story?  In those terms, the UNC Tarheels were too good to pass up.

“They said I was going to be the next Jordan … (cue old highlights of Jordan during his UNC years playing along side of Harrison Barnes highlights) … they said I was going to be the next [insert name here of whatever superstar played for whichever team Barnes plays for in the NBA] … (cue superstar highlights along side NBA Harrison Barnes highlights) … instead, I was the first Harrison Barnes … who’s next?” … (cue the kids playing in the park or in their school gym, each saying “I’m next”, cut to the Black Falcon logo with the “Who’s next?” tagline) … and, cut.

That’s the exciting conclusion to the Harrison Barnes story.  His entire life working backwards from that 30 second TV ad.  That’s all you need to know about Harrison Barnes.  Each and every one of us is just a character in that commercial to him, a future customer.  If you don’t believe me on that, well, you’ve just fallen for his sales pitch harder than I have.  Buyer beware.

It’s easy to say that this is all just sour grapes that he didn’t pick the team I wanted him to pick on that Friday the 13th when he Skyped his commitment to Roy Williams.  Part of it certainly is, as Harrison Barnes would have been a tremendous addition to this year’s Duke team.  As a Duke fan, it was like a punch to the gut watching the press conference, confused when he stepped up to the podium and began dialing Roy Williams’ office.  Even more insulting was knowing that Coach K and his staff found out about Barnes’ decision the same way that I did … sitting in front of a computer, watching the press conference, waiting to see which team he chose.  And it wasn’t enough to put on a hat, or to pick up a card in front of him.  He had scheduled a Skype session with Coach Williams and the entire UNC team in one final orchestrated side show to end the saga of his recruitment.  The smug look on Roy’s face, the false surprise of being the coach Barnes’ would select, it was everything short of Coach Williams waving to the camera with “Hi Mike” written with a marker on his palm.  Here was a kid who, one second, was giving you his selfless, introspective side, giving such kind comments about each school in the running for his services, and the next showing his need for attention and his “all eyes on me” approach to living his life.  Duke has lost more recruits than its signed, and it never was painful to get the news of Boynton choosing Florida or even Wright choosing North Carolina.  Barnes knew the path to becoming a legend at UNC was to become hated at Duke.  For that moment, he succeeded.  He was an important recruit to begin with, but his commitment served as a death blow to Duke and as a validation of North Carolina as the king of Tobacco Road.  He rode the momentum of his charade of a decision making process through the summer All-star circuit and onto the First Team Pre-season All-America team, the first freshman ever to do so.  Barnes was the most hyped player coming into the 2010-11 basketball season, not based on success on the basketball court, but based on his successful conquest of the national basketball media.

To look at Harrison Barnes as a person and not as a basketball player is only telling half of the story.  Barnes struggled to live up to expectations at the start of the season, little of which had to do with his actual ability as a basketball player.  The hype was simply too much to overcome, but it was not a battle that Barnes would have to fight on his own.  Basketball pundits battled each other for the chance to explain away how they’d all been duped by an 18-year-old, the most laughable being Jay Bilas’ diatribe on “What if Harrison Barnes made one more shot each game?”  Complete with an ESPN graphic and all, Bilas angrily attacked those who dared to doubt Barnes’ ability (translation: Bilas’ ability to analyze talent) by proving that if Harrison Barnes was better, he’d be better.  As the freshman gained his legs and caught up to the speed of the college game, he played remarkably well on the offensive side of the ball.  A key to Barnes’ success was the emergence of Kendall Marshall, a fellow freshman who thrives on putting the spotlight on others versus a Junior Larry Drew who was determined to inexplicably keep the spotlight on himself.  Barnes began to hit big shots, game winning shots, and grew his persona as a player who lives for heroics.  Looking back to Harrison Barnes as a person, that’s not surprising that he has a real talent for hitting clutch shots … those are commercial moments.  No one remembers a shot in the first half, but everyone remembers the shot to win the game.

As a player, Barnes is an accurate shooter when he takes good shots and has a strong ability to finish around the rim.  When driven to, he’s a hard worker, and doesn’t shy away from personal challenges.  He’s got good size for a wing player and struggles to create his own shot off of the dribble except for a step back jump shot which can be deadly if you don’t know it’s coming.  He’d be a high draft pick right now, and he’ll continue to get better.

This brings us to the decision that Barnes, like all underclassmen, has to face right now.  Does he go to the NBA, which is the destination that his pre-written story ultimately takes him?  Or does he stay at North Carolina?  There is no doubt in my mind that he’ll be back for his sophomore season, and he’ll do it for the one reason that no one will talk about.  We’ll hear stories of how much he loves North Carolina, how he wants to win a championship, how he’s not ready to leave his teammates.  We’ll hear about how committed he is to academics, how he wants to grow as a leader.  Harrison Barnes will be back for one reason, and one reason only … there are many stars in the NBA, there are a handful in college basketball.  Barnes needs to be talked about.  He needs more highlights.  He needs more material for his biography.  He needs more stories about him dribbling alone for hours in the dark, vowing to never miss the shot again that he missed against Kentucky.  He needs more customers.  Barnes never was playing for an NBA contract, he’s playing for endorsements.  He’s playing for stock prices.  He’s playing for the love of the game, but that game is not basketball.  If he does decide to go to the NBA, it will be because he feels like his brand has matured enough to go to the next level.  It will not be because he’s always dreamed of playing in the NBA, or because he wants to win a ring.  Can Harrison Barnes move more units from the family store, or is it time to go public?  That’s what it comes down to.  What’s the next scene scheduled to be filmed?

And most of you are going to continue to fall for it, and you’ll line up in droves to buy what he’s selling.  Me?  I don’t buy fake merchandise.

Duke’s Post-Season Chances

As a soon-to-be-unemployed man once famously said, “You have to make shots.”  Across the online community of Duke fans, ideas of how Duke can re-invent the wheel for a post-season run are plentiful following a fairly lopsided loss at rival UNC last Saturday night.  Kelly needs to go to the bench, Singler needs to stop shooting, Andre Dawkins needs 30+ minutes … just a quick taste of the bits of advice being thrown K’s way through message boards and blogs.  As a recently-named-COY-by-default also famously said, “I am a coach.  So there’s not one freakin’ thing that anybody’s going to think about that we haven’t thought about.”

The need to re-invent the wheel is simply not there for the Blue Devils.  With a record of 27-4 and a top 5 ranking under their belt, it’s not like Duke is the sinking ship that some would like to make them out to be.  As Coach Lowe, or Mr. Lowe in case some news comes out before I hit ‘publish’, likes to point out, it’s about Duke making shots.  While it’s helpful for Duke to be on target with long range shooting, it’s not necessary.  Duke wins games when it plays good defense and when it limits second chance points.  When Duke is not hitting shots, there is a much smaller margin for error on the defensive end.  None of this is earth-shattering and essentially boils down to this … if Duke runs into a hot shooting team who is also good on the offensive glass, Duke needs to hit shots to have a chance to win.  Surprisingly enough, this is the same prognosis for every other “tournament favorite” as well.  Duke is good enough to win without any drastic changes or sweeping lineup changes, as are about 8 other teams. 

Having said that, Duke should go with four outside (Curry, Smith, Dawkins, Singler) and one post player (Plumlee) like the 2000-01 team when Nate James went to the bench allowing for the same system with Duhon, Williams, Dunleavy and Battier as the four and Carlos Boozer as the one.  I know, I know.  Keep my damn phone calls to myself. 

Referees Butcher St. John’s / Rutgers Big East Tournament Matchup

Whenever ESPN opts for a camera shot of the referees hurrying off of the court and into the tunnel over the standard crowd reaction shot or the handshake line, there is a good chance something crazy just happened prior to the end of the game.  While this video doesn’t show St. John’s probably fouling Rutgers on a driving shot to take the lead seconds earlier and doesn’t show a St. John’s player probably going over-the-back after the missed front end of a one-and-one, it does show what seems to be one of the worst calls in college basketball history.  A travel, out-of-bounds, take your pick from either of those two calls … however, neither call was made the final 1.7 seconds ticked off of the clock sealing a St. John’s win instead of giving the ball at midcourt to Rutgers with a chance to win or tie.  Clearly the referees just mentally checked out during the final few seconds.  A certain cheerleader at Louisville probably wishes this happened more often in the Big East.

ACC Tournament Kicks-off in Greensboro

Ah, ACC Thursday.  I remember this day vividly as a kid.  We’d all go from class to class excitedly talking about being able to watch the games on TV the next day in those same classes when the tournament actually started.  Not much has changed since those days.  But if you’re dying to watching ACC hoops today, you have four games to choose from:

12:00 PM – #8 UVA vs. #9 Miami

2:00 PM – #5 Boston College vs. #12 Wake Forest

7:00 PM – #7 Maryland vs. #10 NC State

9:00 PM – #6 Virginia Tech vs. #11 Georgia Tech

The most (err … only) interesting storylines from today will be the potential last games in this event for Sidney Lowe and Paul Hewitt.  Boston College and Virginia Tech can likely play their way into the tournament with wins, and Maryland can play their way off of the bubble (in the wrong direction) with a loss against State.  I like all three of those things to happen today.  UNC fans should be paying close attention to the UVA/Miami game as UVA can beat UNC but Miami cannot.  In the end, I have Duke beating UNC in the finals on Sunday.

The Sound and the Curry

“They were nuts.” 

Those were the words from Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski to describe his team’s mental state in the first half against rival North Carolina as the Devils headed to the locker room down 43-29 with seemingly little hope of slowing down the league’s hottest team.  Those same words could have been used to describe the fans that packed every corner of Cameron Indoor Stadium as those same Blue Devils left the court following a 50-30 second half run good enough to extend the ‘Battle of the Blues’ winning streak to 3 games and wins in 20 of the last 29 matchups with the Tarheels.

According to reports, the noise-level in Cameron reached a peak of 121.3 decibels which ranks louder than the noise at a rock concert.  Looking back, it was never the intensity of the noise that was so impressive, it was the longevity.  At even the darkest of moments for Blue Devil fans, hopeful yells still echoed off of every beam and every banner as the fans made sure it was clear that no matter what UNC did in the first half, Duke was not going to go away.  The eruption of noise when Seth Curry cut the lead to 6 points just two and a half minutes into the second half was so deafening that Kendall Marshall couldn’t hear the referee blow his whistle while standing three feet away from him. 

It would not be the only time Curry would bring the house down as he notched 22 points on just 12 shots while grabbing 6 rebounds and dishing out 5 assists.  Curry’s performance, one of the greatest debut performances in the history of the rivalry, both simultaneously turned Cameron into an explosion of sound while also silencing critics who have written off Duke’s chances to repeat without a viable third scoring option.  But as sensational as Curry’s introduction to the rivalry was, it was Nolan Smith’s farewell that was legendary. 

The senior captain’s 34 points were distributed into 12 first half points that served as defensive jabs to allow Duke to avoid being trapped on the ropes and 22 second half points that came in the form of uppercuts and overhand haymakers.  Fans waited patiently during his post-game interviews just to give their captain one last round of applause as he jogged to the locker room.  Or maybe they just didn’t want the night to end.  After all, this win was one of those moments that make fans want to wrap their arms around the program and give it a huge hug.  That’s what makes the rivalry great and so unique.  It’s much more than a struggle for temporary bragging rights that last until the next meeting.  It’s a battle to earn the right to mold a series of moments into a memory that will forever be etched into the hearts of the participants.  For those who were lucky enough to be there, the ringing in their ears may never go away.  And no one is complaining.

Duke vs. UNC: Crazies Hold the Key

With the Packers/Steelers undercard matchup in the books, it’s on to the greatest rivalry in all of sport … Duke vs. North Carolina.  Perception is that Duke is holding on by a thread through the injury of superstar point guard Kyrie Irving while the Tarheels are surging back towards the top behind the emergence of Kendall Marshall and Harrison Barnes.  Whether or not either those statements is anywhere close to reality remains to be seen, but it is impossible to ignore that UNC is arguably the hottest team in the ACC at the moment.  Duke still seems poised to emerge from the 2010-’11 campaign as the class of the league, but UNC has the tools in place to win as well.  There are so many reasons why each team could win this matchup … Duke’s shooting, UNC’s interior offense, Duke’s ability to shut down opposing guards, UNC’s shocking return to playing pressure defense, and so on.  The difference in this game, however, likely will not be any of the above.  The key to this game may very well be the building that’s hosting it.

Cameron Indoor Stadium boasts the longest winning streak of any venue in Division I college basketball.  Duke has not lost a men’s basketball game in Cameron since February 11th, 2009.  Over the last three seasons, Duke teams have only lost three games of any kind in Cameron (two volleyball matches, and a women’s basketball matchup against UCONN).  In men’s basketball games, Duke teams have been extremely poor hosts to their visitors from the Tar Heel state going 7-0 during the current winning streak with an average score of 92-65.  The most points scored during that stretch was 101 against Charlotte in 2010 and 101 against 8th ranked Wake Forest in 2009.  The least amount of points allowed was 50 against the Tarheels in the last meeting between these two teams.

While UNC has had recent success in Cameron Indoor Stadium, or as UNC fans like joke, “Hansbrough Indoor Stadium”, last year’s game showed what can happen to a team without senior leadership making the trip into Durham.  And if last year’s team lacked experience and leadership, this year’s group of Tarheels is even younger than last year’s version.  Tyler Zeller is the only Tarheel ever to play in a win at Cameron Indoor Stadium.  Alone, that statement is not all that uncommon in a series that has been filled with back-and-forth swings through the years, but considering Duke is on a one-game winning streak against the Heels in Durham, it’s a stark illustration of how young and inexperienced Roy Williams’ team is. 

The Heels have not played in a hostile environment since November of this year when they lost by 12 to host Illinois.  Though off to a fast start in ACC road games and coming off a complete away-game dismantling of Boston College, The Conte is hardly an intimidating place to play.  The Thrillerdome in Atlanta is a shell of what it used to be, but the Jackets were able to ride the home crowd to a 20-point win over the Heels, granted that came during a lull in the performance of UNC and really jump-started the recent rise into the Top 25.  Carolina will be starting Kendall Marshall coming off of a fantastic 16-assist performance against the league’s best defense, but few freshman point guards have survived their first trip to Cameron Indoor Stadium.  Just ask NBA superstar Chris Paul about his first visit to Durham which ended with the phenom crying on the bench as Duke rolled to victory over highly-ranked Wake Forest. 

Pundits will discuss matchups all week long … Henson vs. Plumlee, Thornton vs. Marshall, Smith and Singler vs. Bullock and Barnes.  There are plenty of punches and counter-punches to be thrown each way.  But in the end, it will be the young Tarheels’ ability to walk into the Lion’s Den without fear that will decide the game.  Duke’s 6th man has a huge opportunity to play a role in extending the nation’s longest home-court winning streak.  Should the Crazies have the chance to chant their famous “Our House!” cheer as the clock winds down to zeroes, those two words will certainly take their rightful place in the rivalry’s never-ending story.

Drew, Williams Burn Bridges in Transfer Shocker

Larry Drew II quit the North Carolina basketball team.  In February.  Via a phone call from his father.

Regardless of any reason behind his decision to leave the surging Tarheels behind, that type of behavior is not the kind of thing you want becoming your reputation in today’s world where information travels faster than Tyler Hansbrough on the low blocks.  First, Drew is putting his team in a tight spot.  Kendall Marshall, who has taken over Drew’s role as the starter during UNC’s four game winning streak, has come on quite nicely as the facilitator of North Carolina’s offense.  Through Marshall’s play, John Henson and Harrison Barnes have greatly increased their scoring production, and Marshall’s penetration has given sharpshooter Reggie Bullock plenty of open looks from three point range.

Now Marshall will need to pace himself for a significant increase in minutes per game, and will need to shift his attention to guarding the opposing point guard as well.  In the short term, his assignments will include chasing around two of the ACC’s best backcourts when the Heels play Florida State and have two games remaining against defending National Champion Duke.  The timing of Drew’s “transfer” could not have been worse for the Heels, and the way in which the announcement went down is not doing Drew any favors either.

Larry Drew II has one year of eligibility remaining, and by transferring after the start of the second semester, Drew will need to sit out an entire season should he land on a Division I roster.  He will need a school to be willing to wait a full year before giving Drew a scholarship to play for one season.  And then there’s “Big Larry”.  The Larry Drews (both I and II) are being thrown under the bus at every opportunity.  A coach who takes Drew will be doing so with a tremendous risk if Larry I is as overbearing as he’s being made out to be.  I would be shocked if Larry Drew II ever plays Division I basketball again.  The North Carolina reputation is strong throughout college athletics and the media, and it will be hard for anyone to see the Drews’ side of the story.

But the Drew family isn’t the only party here who needs to worry about burning bridges.  Larry Drew I is an NBA coach and a well-repsected member of the professional basketball community.  If there is one landmine out there right now for Roy Williams, its the threat of having his name thrown around in a negative light among NBA coaches and scouts.  If everything that’s being said about Drew is true, it would be hard to imagine that Drew is speaking favorably of Roy’s ability to coach and manage a program.  Additionally, Drew is now the third transfer this season from Roy Williams’ program, all from the state of California.  The next time the UNC coaching staff heads out west, he’ll be fighting a perception that UNC isn’t a great place for West-coast kids for whatever reason … too far from home, different lifestyle, or worse, Williams is not a coach you’d want to play for.  These will be realities that Williams will need to face on the recruiting trail.

And speaking of recruiting, Roy now has a spot to fill.  And it’s a spot that might have already been taken care of if Roy had taken a few different steps during recruiting for 2011.  Both Duke and UNC were dealing with Quinn Cook, an elite point guard from Oak Hill Academy in the coveted “DMV” area (DC, Maryland, Virginia).  Both schools were also dealing with the country’s best high school player, Austin Rivers, son of Doc Rivers.  Austin committed to Duke the day before his official visit to UNC, and although Duke was considered to be the heavy favorite all along for Rivers, you have to wonder if a conversation ever took place between “Big Larry” and Doc about how Austin might enjoy a career at UNC.

Austin Rivers selected Duke, and immediately began to actively recruit for his future team.  The long-rumored wavering commitment to Texas by superstar Myck Kabongo became a reality when he de-committed from the Longhorns and spoke of playing with his best friend Austin Rivers in Durham as if it were a real possibility.  Upon this news, UNC cranked up the heat on Quinn Cook, who was rumored to be days away from a Duke commitment at that point.  This move seemingly forced Coach K and the Blue Devils to take a stance on which guard they’d rather have, and they chose to stick with Cook.  Almost immediately, Kabongo re-committed to Texas to put an end to the transparent “soul searching” exercise.  When the dust settled, Duke had a five-star point guard, Texas kept their man, and UNC was left to move forward with Kendall Marshall and Larry Drew II.

Until Roy got the phone call from “Big Larry”, that is …

Castaways

(courtesy of @PhysioNiccoli)