#3 Villanova/#14 American in NCAA First Round Preview - Part 2 - Looking at American's Patriot League Schedule and Results

To the Wildcat faithful-

In Part 2 of the #3 Villanova/#14 American NCAA First Round Preview, I'll look at American's Patriot League schedule and results, and see what we can learn about the Eagles, and what it might tell us about Thursday...

Part 2 - American's Patriot League Schedule and Results

American finished with a 24-7 record overall, 13-1 in regular-season Patriot League play, and won three games in the conference tournament. According to Jerry Palm's CollegeRPI.com, American finished - as of March 9 - with a RPI of 77, which is outstanding for a Patriot League team. As a member of the Patriot League, AU finished with a SOS of 239, which gives an indication of the weakness of the conference - especially because the Eagles had an extremely rigorous nonconference schedule for a low-major conference team.

What does this information tell us?

Patriot League Schedule

American entered the Patriot League with a 8-5 record. The Eagles then won the Patriot League regular-season and tournament championships, which clearly established them as the premier team in the conference. American went 13-1 in the regular season before winning three games in the tournament, leaving them at 16-1.

American won the regular-season Patriot League by two games over Holy Cross, which finished 11-3. However, the Eagles did have a number of close calls, despite losing only a single game, @ Holy Cross. They won two games in overtime - against the two teams which (BTW) have the oldest intercollegiate football rivalry. One was Lehigh at home, but the other was really surprising - @ Lafayette, which finished in a last-place tie in the eight-team conference with a record of 4-10, 8-22 (306 RPI). And that was in the season finale.

Other close victories were @ Navy (one point) and @ Bucknell. Travelling to Jay Wright's alma mater - which finished in seventh place, along with the aforementioned Lafayette, the Bison finished 4-10, 7-23 (293), and the Eagles won by just two points. Less surprisingly, American beat Holy Cross and Navy at home, by five and six points respectively.

Patriot League Tournament

The Eagles did enjoy a huge advantage, in that the entire tournament was in Washington. After surviving @ Lafayette in overtime in the season finale, the top-seeded Eagles got to face them again, just four days later. And this time, American won 78-56.

The semifinals were another matter, especially in light of the fact that American had conquered Army easily in both regular-season games. First, American won in Washington, allowing just 34 points in a 22-point victory. Then, @ West Point, the Eagles held the Black Knights to just 36 points in a 24 point victory. So it was extraordinarily surprising, that after scoring just 70 points - combined - in two previous games against American, the Black Knights nearly stunned American in the semifinals in DC, losing just 61-60.

American faced the runner-up, Holy Cross, in the final; they had split the series with the Crusaders, each team winning at home. And in DC, the pattern held true; however, the Eagles had no trouble claiming the NCAA bid, conquering the Crusaders 73-57 (they had won by six at home in the regular season.)

Part 3 will be coming up soon...

Go Wildcats!

#3 Villanova Faces #14 American in NCAA First Round in Philadelphia on Thursday!!!

To the Wildcat faithful-

The headline says it all...

Villanova/American Rivalry History

As the teams are separated by only about 140 miles, most of it highway, it is not surprising that they have met eight times. Villanova has swept all of them, and the last game was in December 1993.

The first meeting was on February 20, 1932, at American's home court. The Wildcats won by the margin of 25-19. It took another 32 years before they would play once more, at what is now Jake Nevin Field House, on January 30, 1964. This time it wasn't as close, as Villanova won 84-49. The Wildcats returned the favor during the following season, on December 10, 1964, and won 65-48.

Another decade passed, and the teams opted to play a home-and-home series, during the 1975-76 and 1976-77 seasons. The Eagles made their first trip to the Palestra, where the Wildcats triumphed, 68-55, on December 5, 1975. Returning to AU, Villanova won 69-60 on December 6, 1976.

Fifteen years elapsed before the next meeting. Judging from the dates, it appears that a "two-for-one" home-and-home series was arranged, which is not unusual, in circumstances when a power conference team schedules a non-power conference team. The non-power conference team lacks the leverage to negotiate a true home-and-home, so they offer to go twice in return for one return trip.

So the Eagles flew into the Pavilion for the first time on December 14, 1991, to face Rollie Massimino's final Wildcats team - and Villanova won 78-64. When Steve Lappas, a former Villanova assistant, took over the team the following season - he made his debut as a head coach at nowhere other than AU's Bender Arena (a very good venue, if you've never had occasion to see it) on December 5, 1992. This was the worst team Villanova has had in the Big East era (before or since), as it ultimately went 8-19. They did, however, have enough to get past the host Eagles, 86-74, to start Lappas off at 1-0 as the head coach at Villanova. After the trip back from DC, though, things didn't go well the rest of the season, as the team won only seven more games, making neither the NCAA nor the NIT, for the first time in 13 years.

American completed the two-for-one agreement by returning to the Pavilion on December 1, 1993, where they were crushed, 94-62, by the Wildcats, who would eventually win the NIT that season. The teams haven't met since then.

Some things have changed, of course. At the time of the two-for-one series in the early 1990s, AU was a member of the Colonial Athletic Association (CAA), a good mid-major conference with a knack for pulling off big upsets in the NCAA tournament (Richmond, a member at the time, and most recently George Mason's Cinderella Final Four run). Since then, AU has moved down to the Patriot League, a conference of fine academic institutions that is a low-major conference.

Of course, there will be a lot more to come, so check back later - but in the meantime....

Go Wildcats!

The Ultimate NCAA Sweet 16 Villanova/North Carolina Preview, Part 3

To the Wildcat faithful-

In Part 3, we break down the 2004-05 Tar Heels' season and players, and look at the intangibles entering Friday's game...

Carolina This Year

The Tar Heels are enjoying their first unalloyed season of success since Guthridge left after the Final Four in 2000. There was a revival of positive focus on the Tar Heels this year, since all five starters were coming back and Carolina was voted #2 in the ACC pre-season poll.

Out-of-conference

The season got off to a rocky start when the Tar Heels were whipped by 11, while visiting unheralded Santa Clara in Oakland (but basically a home game for the Broncos in the Pete Newell Challenge) in the November 19 opener (Felton missed the game). However, Carolina righted the ship, ripping off 14 straight victories and soaring near the top of the polls. Victims:

BYU, @ Tennessee, Iowa, USC, @ Indiana, #8 Kentucky (by 13), Loyola-Chicago, @ newly-minted ACC member Virginia Tech, NCAA qualifier Vermont, UNC-Wilmington, Cleveland State, William & Mary. Most were blowouts: the Tar Heels scored 105 points or more in four of those games.. In a remarkable coincidence, Carolina will now have faced three programs closely associated with Rollie Massimino in one year: Vermont (his alma mater), Cleveland State (where he ended up after Villanova), and of course, Villanova on Friday - probably the first and only team ever to play those three diverse programs in the same year. (Maybe it's a good omen... :)

ACC play

What troubled the ACC was that the blowouts didn't cease, once Carolina began conference play and facing schools in its own weight class. The Tar Heels buzzed through the first half of ACC competition, as well. In its first two ACC contests, Carolina beat #21 Maryland by 34, 109-75, and then #8 Georgia Tech by 22.

The Tar Heels fell at #3 Wake Forest by 13, for only their second loss of the year, dropping their record to 3-1, 14-2. But then the blowout wins began to mount again. Carolina leveled its next five ACC opponents - @ Clemson, Miami, @ Virginia, NC State, and @ Florida State - by margins of 19 or more. The centerpiece was a 110-76 massacre at UVA which certainly didn't help Pete Gillen's chances of surviving this season (which he hasn't, subsequently.)

And so Carolina entered the most popular regular-season game of the year nationally, the Duke/Carolina game at Cameron on Feb. 8, with a 19-2, 8-1 mark, to take on the #8 Blue Devils (many of whose current students had no direct firsthand experience of Carolina being good).

To return to Smith to a moment, he did NOT like losing at Cameron, nor did he find the antics of the Duke students (which were often directed at him and his godlike status) entertaining. According to Feinstein, "Smith has never found the Duke students as amusing as most others do. His rivalry with them is probably as intense as with any coach or team... He wasn't thrilled in 1988 when, after he had been in a fender bender with a Duke campus bus outside the Duke chapel (he was taking his parents to church there) they loudly chanted, 'Dean Can't Drive' when he appeared in Cameron that season." After Duke captured its second straight national title in 1992, Smith was greeted with chants of "Mike's got two, Dean's got one" during Carolina's visit there in 1993 (a pointed reference to Smith's sole national title in 1982 with Jordan). But unfortunately the chant could only be used for a single game, as Carolina went on to defeat Chris Webber and Michigan's Fab Five in the 1993 title game, in the infamous too-many-timeouts fiasco (Webber called a timeout the Wolverines didn't have at crunch time, leading to a technical foul and handing the game to Carolina, although the Tar Heels certainly might have won the game in any event.)

I don't particularly like Duke either, and although I love Dick Vitale, the one aspect of Dickie V I don't like is his genuflection before coaches in general and Coach K in particular. But, in much the same vein as my enjoyment of Carolina's early 21st-century struggles, I do find it cool that even in the state of North Carolina, that Smith got treated as something less than an imperial figure, even if for only two hours at Cameron once a year.

"If Dean Smith had been candid on one subject over the years, it was the fact that he enjoyed nothing more than beating Duke at Duke. He had never liked the irreverent atmosphere of Cameron; Duke was the archrival and the greatest threat - long-term - to Carolina's mastery of the ACC. Krzyzewski's presence over the years had made it more person. Smith always had his team ready for Cameron. He was 18-17 throughout his lengthy career there and there is little doubt that each of the 18 ranked high on his list of satisfying wins."

(That's pretty incredible - 18 wins - and a winning record! - at Cameron. Obviously, nobody else will ever approach that.)

Back to 2005, when Duke outlasted UNC in another classic, 71-70. Whether as a result of that game or otherwise, Carolina's dominance was not as extreme the rest of the year. They consoled themselves after the loss by flying up to Hartford and beating the defending national champion, #14 Connecticut, 77-70. The Tar Heels followed it up by crushing both Virginia and Clemson at the DeanDome.

Which brings me to my next point-

Incredible, but true: Clemson and Carolina are both charter members of the ACC, founded in 1953 as a secession movement from the Southern Conference (cheap joke, but they know all about secession movements down there.) And they have played each other well before the ACC was founded; they've faced each other since 1926.

Clemson has traveled to Carolina, no fewer than 50 times since then.

But the Tigers have NEVER won at Chapel Hill.

Ever. Not a single time in 79 years.

After three more wins this year, Carolina now leads the all-time series by an incredible margin of 116-19 - how can you be almost a hundred games under .500 against an opponent? :) Even Matt Doherty went 5-2 against Clemson.

Granted, Clemson is a football school in a basketball conference, but that's still a record of futility that strains even the fertile imagination of the basketball gods. It is by far the longest such streak in NCAA history of one school failing to win at another school. Clemson couldn't even beat Matt Doherty in three tries, although his third year, the Tigers only lost by two at the Smith Center. And if they couldn't beat HIM at Chapel Hill, odds are that it may NEVER happen :)

And for what it's worth, Carolina's ACC victory margins began to drop a little bit. In the trip to NC State, whom they had flattened by 24 in the first game, they won by 10. In the trip to Maryland, whom they had annihilated, they won by just two, although they did beat Florida State by 15. To cap off the regular season, the Tar Heels won the rematch against Duke at the DeanDome, on March 6, winning 75-73. The Tar Heels won the ACC regular season at 14-2, after finishing fifth last year at 8-8. It was the first time anyone had gone from 5th to 1st in one year since Georgia Tech did it back in 1996, and the first time anyone had jumped six ACC wins in one year since Duke also did it in 1996.

Carolina struggled in the ACC tournament, though, especially in light of how dominant it had been in the regular season. A possible reason: in a historical anomaly, the ACC tournament shifted north to Washington, DC's MCI Center, home of the Georgetown Hoyas, as a sop to the northern schools in the conference, Maryland and Virginia. Traditionally it had been held in North Carolina, close to UNC, NC State, Duke, and Wake Forest, most frequently at Reynolds Coliseum at NC State - which for many years was the premier sporting venue in the state - and then to the true-neutral Greensboro Coliseum.

After topping Clemson by 51 points in two meetings, Carolina struggled with the Tigers in DC, winning by just seven, and then was upset by #25 Georgia Tech in the semifinals, 78-75, the second straight loss to former VU assistant Paul Hewitt's Yellow Jackets in the conference tournament. The Tar Heels finished with a record of 27-4 overall, 14-2 ACC.

The loss didn't cost them a #1 seed, however. The loss to Santa Clara (a middle-of-the-pack West Coast Conference team) was about the only thing that could, and it was so long ago that it didn't appear to hurt them (and Felton didn't play in that game). It was UNC's NCAA-record tenth #1 seed, but its first in seven years, and Williams' sixth after five with KU.

North Carolina sprinted effortlessly throughout the first two rounds of the tournament. They were rewarded with the right to face the play-in game winner of Oakland/Alabama A&M. (There should be a level playing field. It's not equitable to have to prepare for one opponent, fly to Dayton and play, and then fly to another site where a #1 seed is waiting for you, having rested for four or five days. One extra at-large team should be omitted and all the automatic bids given legitimate chances to win by abolishing the play-in game.) In the first round, as expected, UNC did not break a sweat in defeating Oakland, 96-68. On Sunday, while Villanova was finishing off Florida, Carolina overcame a momentarily sluggish start to breeze past #9 Iowa State, 92-65. ISU led 13-12 in the early going, before Carolina turned off the after-burners.

Breaking Down The Tar Heels

Judging from the team statistics and the Iowa State box score, it is clear Williams will only use eight players in his rotation against Villanova. Everyone on the team got into that game, but only eight guys played 13 minutes or more, and if they didn't play more than three minutes in that game, we won't see them. Eight guys average more than 16.5 minutes a game.

Unfortunately for us, the Tar Heels are VERY deep and VERY good, which is why they are 29-4 this year and have the top seed.

Depth isn't an issue. Williams doesn't have a single player logging more than 31.5 minutes a game, and only Raymond Felton has more than 26.0 per game. They also have eight other guys on their bench. Nine different players have started at least one game, and Marvin Williams, who made the ACC All-Freshman team, isn't one of them.

They lead the nation in scoring with nearly 90 points a game (88.8), and have won nine games by 30 or more points, including six trips past the century mark. Five guys average double figures or better. Carolina hasn't enjoyed such well-balanced scoring since 1995, when a team led by Jerry Stackhouse and Rasheed Wallace also had five guys do it. And they draw a lot of fouls: Carolina has made more FTs this season than its opponents have attempted. During the final week of the season, the Tar Heels ranked in the top 10 nationally in eight different categories: scoring and scoring margin, FG%, 3FG%, rebounding margin, assists/game, steals/game, and winning percentage.

Nor is it all offensive firepower. The Tar Heels force 19 turnovers a game and have many active defenders.

Here's another overall view. According to one veteran, Washington, DC-based college basketball observer, who has seen the Tar Heels play several times this season:

"This Carolina team reminds me of the '94 UNC team with Rasheed [Wallace], [Jerry] Stackhouse, [Jeff] McInnis -- all of whom are still in the NBA today -- as well as Donald Williams and Eric Montross, who had played key roles in the '93 championship team. The '94 Carolina team was the consensus preseason #1, and had by far the most talent in the country... and got knocked off in the second round of the Tournament. [Note: The observer is referring to the 1994 game when 9th-seeded Boston College upset the top-seeded Tar Heels in the second round of the NCAA tournament, behind 21 points from Gerrod Abram. The Heels, just one year removed from a national championship, went 28-7, came in second in the ACC regular season, won the ACC tournament, qualified as a #1 seed, but were bounced in Landover, Md., by the Eagles, a very rare second-round exit for a Smith-coached squad.] "This Carolina team is similar. Four future NBA first-round draft picks. Loads of talent. But they don't play together as a team. In 6 or 7 years, everyone will look back and say, 'How did these guys not win the National Championship?' But mark my words, they will not." "Like the '94 team, the whole is less than the sum of the parts. Maybe they'll lose to Villanova, maybe they won't... but they're ripe for the taking."

Starters

The horse in the middle is Sean May. A first-team All-ACC selection, May was simply unstoppable against the Cyclones on Sunday, turning in a monster performance with 24 points (on 8-9 shooting) and 17 rebounds in only 30 minutes. May was named recently to sundry All-America teams, usually second-team. He averaged 16.5 pts/10.7 rebounds and just over one blocked shot a game, just the 12th Tar Heel to ever average a double-double in points/rebounds for an entire season. Among the list is Billy Cunningham and Bobby Jones, both 76ers legends.

May is the son of Scott May, who was the National Player of the Year on the last NCAA team to go undefeated, the 1976 Indiana Hoosiers under the odious Bob Knight.

Another big gun is Rashad McCants, who averages 15.8 pts and shoots threes at a 40.6% clip. McCants, a junior, was actually a first-team All-ACC pick last season but made only the third team this year. May or may not come back for a senior year. Got sick in February and missed the last four ACC games, including the home finale against Duke. Here's a scary fact: McCants' absence seemed to be barely noticed by Carolina, which won all four games without him: at bubble team Maryland, at crosstown rival and Sweet 16 member NC State, Florida State, and of course Duke at the Smith Center. He returned with seemingly no ill-effects for the ACC tournament, where he scored 30 points in two games.

At one forward spot is Jawad Williams, a senior, and McDonald's AA from Cleveland. He's third in the ACC in FG% at 54.9% and has improved at all aspects of his game, relative to his first three years, showing substantial improvements in every category. He doesn't get the ink of Felton, May and McCants, but Dickie V named him to his "All-Support" Team in December. He ended up getting some recognition, though, finishing up as a third-team All-ACC selection.

Good news for 'Nova: Williams averages 14.1 a game, but his shot noticeably tailed off down the stretch, possibly because of fatigue. After routinely breaking double figures all year, he only broke double figures in one of Carolina's last four games before the NCAA tournament and shot only 11-35 in them. Reportedly, according to CarolinaBlue.com posters, these fades at the end of the season are typical of Williams due to injuries.

And don't foul him - he's an 84% shooter.

One guard is junior Raymond Felton. Felton was also accorded first-team all-ACC honors and was the Maui Invitational MVP. Felton, who has started all but one game since arriving in Chapel Hill, is an outstanding defensive player, narrowing missing being named to the conference's all-defensive team, finishing sixth in the voting. Felton also sharply improved his shot this year, making Carolina's already formidable offense that much stronger. Entering the season his career shooting percentage was 40.7%, now it's 46.1%. But even more dramatic was his improvement from beyond the arc, which vaulted from 34.1% to 44.0%; he led the ACC in three-point accuracy this year. Felton also led the ACC in assists (for the second straight season) and was third in steals.

Try not get confused with all of these Williamses - in addition to coach Roy, there are two members of the rotation also named Williams, Jawan and Marvin. Marvin was a unanimous ACC All-Freshman team and deemed the #1 Impact Diaper Dandy by Dickie V, pulling down five ACC Rookie of the Week awards this year.

Finally, there is Jackie Manuel, a 6-5 senior swingman, a defensive specialist, named to the All-ACC defensive team. He replaced Melvin Scott in the starting lineup.. He's not a threat to score. He probably would have drawn the assignment of guarding Sumpter if he were playing, and instead may get Foye. Manuel is popular with the Carolina fan base due to his unselfishness and team effort.

Off the Bench

There is Marvin Williams, described above, who averages 11.2 points off the bench. He's the first Tar Heel to average double figures off the bench since Jerry Stackhouse did it in 1994. For a freshman, he has veins of ice, leading the team in FT% at 84.8%, and he gets to the line a lot - he was second on the team in FT attempts, despite the fact that he doesn't start and only averages 22 minutes a game. He is dogged with a sprained toe he suffered in February against UConn and which won't heal fully till the offseason.

Rumors swirl on the Carolina boards that Williams may forego his final three years of eligibility and head for the NBA after this season.

Williams seems to be the Kyle Lowry of the Tar Heels - everyone raves about the lift he provides off the bench.

Next, there is Melvin Scott, a senior guard and former starter, who overcame an extraordinarily difficult childhood (in his media guide essay, Scott notes that he was expelled from five different schools) on the streets of Baltimore, to arrive in Chapel Hill under Doherty as an elite recruit. Scott, now a devout Christian who credits religion with saving him, gave the following answers to a question from the UNC media guide: His favorite person in history he'd like to meet is "Moses, to ask him how he parted the Red Sea". He wears #1 because "#10 was retired and I'm the first #1 in the history of Carolina". Scott, undoubtedly because of his background, is very serene about his diminished role at Carolina under Williams.

Finally, the eighth member of the rotation is David Noel, a junior from nearby Durham. Noel is another defensive specialist, similar to Manuel, and his backup, but can dunk and shoot the three-ball if necessary.

Overall Intangibles

Remember, Carolina is only three years removed from a 8-20 season, and three of UNC's rotation - Jawad Williams, Manuel, Scott - played on that team. Most of them - all juniors and seniors - have firsthand memories of Doherty, and were recruited by him. This is not your typical Carolina team brimming with confidence.

In fact, they're only marginally more battle-tested in the NCAA tournament, than absent-for-six-years Villanova. Since going to the Final Four in 2000 in Guthridge's final year, Carolina has won a grand total of two games in the NCAA tournament, both against low seeds, not counting the two they won last weekend (which were also against low seeds).

In short, if you have to face Carolina as a #1 seed, this is probably the best year ever to do it, before they get that swagger back under Williams... Speaking of whom...Williams, of course, is quite familiar with Sumpter, having coached him on the USA basketball team this summer, although he won't have to face him.. Williams describes Sumpter as "a friend of mine..."

Beating Carolina

Control the perimeter, crash the boards, and shut down Jawad Williams.

Looking at their four losses, helpfully totaled by the Carolina Sports Information Office, two facts jump out as a team. Carolina didn't shoot well, or defend well, from beyond the arc (29.6%, as opposed to 41.8% in their victories). Their opponents shot just 33.5% from beyond the arc in Carolina wins, but 39.0% in Carolina losses.

They also didn't crash the boards, as their opponents nearly matched them at 38.0 boards per game vs. 38.8 for the Tar Heels. In Carolina victories, they rebounded with a vengeance, with 40.6 per game while permitting 31.8 for their opponents.

Also, for individual players, the key appears to be shutting down Jawad Williams. There's more of a divergence for his numbers in wins/losses than any other Tar Heel. Williams averaged 15.0 pts in victories, but Williams literally was "half the man he used to be" in defeats, scoring 7.5 a game in the losses to Santa Clara, Wake Forest, Duke, and Georgia Tech.

Can 'Nova Win?

Well, of course the 'Cats are the underdog, especially without Sumpter, but it wouldn't require a miracle. Villanova has already pummeled Kansas, who is just as good as Carolina (albeit at home, sort of, and with Sumpter). Roy Williams has conceded that the 'Cats will have a LOT more fans there, since it's a lot closer to Villanova.

And the quirk of the Christian calendar, which produced the early Easter holiday, will probably tamp down travel for Carolina fans, who won't have time to go all the way to Syracuse, and still make it home for the holiday (and they probably wouldn't find it worthwhile to go just for one game). (Perhaps a positive omen from the Almighty :)

Plus, Sweet Sixteens obviously aren't a major event to the Carolina fan base, unlike ours. Despite our increasingly rare trips to Syracuse, the 'Cats still will have played in the Carrier Dome more often than the Tar Heels have, so that's a slight advantage as well.

That's it. As I conclude, I would like to extend my deepest gratitude to the UNC Athletic Communications Office, who helpfully rush-mailed me the exquisite UNC Media Guide and Game Notes, so helpful to me in the composition of this guide. And thanks also to the Carolina fans who graciously and articulately responded on message boards, and in e-mail to my requests for information on the Tar Heels.

Go Wildcats!

The Ultimate NCAA Sweet 16 Villanova/North Carolina Preview, Part 2

To the Wildcat faithful-

In Part 2, we look at Roy Williams' tenure, the legendary Carolina/Duke rivalry, some of Carolina's most famous traditions, and Villanova/North Carolina history...

Part 2

And so, after the 2003 season, Roy Williams was finally persuaded to tear up his roots in Lawrence and come back home. As to why he did that the second time, I'm not sure. Carolina had sunk to such depths (and it hasn't recovered fully - it won't until it gets to another Final Four) that Williams might genuinely have felt that Carolina was in a crisis mode; if another disastrous coach was hired, Carolina might sink permanently to the bottom of the rugged ACC. So he might have done it out of a sense of loyalty.

Another more subtle theory I have: Williams was shrewd enough to know that Doherty was likely to fail in Chapel Hill (although I doubt that anyone foresaw that Doherty would be as bad as he was). Doherty had been on his staff at Kansas and Williams had been a Carolina assistant when Doherty had played for the Tar Heels, so they know each other very well. And he recognized that his political standing at UNC would be a lot higher if he came in in the wake of a disaster, rather than right after Guthridge.

This episode was memorialized in college basketball lore, after Kansas fell to Syracuse in the 2003 title game, amidst the firestorm of rumors in the wake of Doherty's demise. In the aftermath of the loss, CBS' Bonnie Bernstein conducted the traditionally awkward losing-coach interview, and asked Williams about the Carolina job. (Williams had never won a national title at Kansas, and so the interview would have awkward even under the best of circumstances.)

Williams tried to deflect the question, which was highly inappropriate given the situation.. (Did she really expect him to answer the question, right then and there?) But Bernstein pressed on, undoubtedly egged on by the producer in her ear (a fact Williams pointedly noted on the air) and Williams - ordinarily a gentleman of high composure - used a four-letter word on live CBS network television. (Remember, this was nine months prior to the Janet Jackson "wardrobe malfunction", which took place during CBS' Super Bowl broadcast the following year. And so Roy Williams using profane language during a major CBS sporting event was considered a major story :)

Thus, Williams returned to Chapel Hill to do what once would have been considered unthinkable - rebuild at Carolina. Williams is by all accounts a decent guy, a southern gentleman, another long-time member of the Carolina family, who actually had far deeper roots in the state than the Kansan Dean Smith. Williams grew up in a small town in North Carolina and played only on the freshman team - then coached by Guthridge - when he attended North Carolina, never the varsity. But Williams learned the Smith system inside and out, and eventually took over for his mentor. After serving as a high school coach in North Carolina for five years, Williams became an assistant to Smith in 1978 at age 27.

Williams spent ten years in Chapel Hill, before taking the head coaching job at Kansas in 1988, despite the fact that he had no ties whatsoever to KU (another storied program with an extended coaching tree) and had never served as a collegiate head coach. He replaced fellow UNC alum Larry Brown, who had just stunned heavily favored Oklahoma to win the national title but left a NCAA mess in his wake. It worked out for both sides: the Smith magic rubbed off, and Williams won big in Lawrence. So big, in fact, that the biggest gripe against him was that he never won a national championship in his 15 years there. (A good problem to have...) Even with last year's mediocre UNC team added in, Williams remains the all-time winning percentage leader among active NCAA coaches.

Among other things, Williams captured nine Big Eight/Big XII regular-season titles, made four appearances in the Final Four (including splitting two games with UNC while there), won 34 NCAA tournament games, reached the Sweet 16 nine times, avoided being upset in the first round in 14 tries, and reached 400 wins faster than any but three coaches in NCAA history. Williams was there for 15 years and reached at least the second round of the NCAA tournament every year he was there, with the exception of his first season, in which he went 19-12. (And which wasn't his fault, because he inherited a team on probation, and accordingly wasn't eligible for the NCAA tournament, anyway.)

His Kansas teams got as high as #2 in the polls, at some point, in 11 of the 15 years, and six of them made it to #1. The Jayhawks in the 1990s once went 145 consecutive AP polls without falling out of the Top 25. In all of his non-probation years, he never failed to win fewer than 23 games a season, and he cleared 30 or more wins five different times, including his final two. Of course, Williams has never lived down the 1997 season, when KU went 34-2 (including a 22-0 start) with Jacque Vaughn, Jerod Haase and Scot Pollard, but failed to reach the Final Four after being upset by Arizona, the eventual winner, in the Sweet 16.

Williams' first year at Carolina, 2003-04, while certainly an improvement over Doherty, was a forgettable year by historical Carolina standards. The team went just .500 in ACC play, finishing 19-11 overall, 8-8 in conference. The one bright spot of the season was upsetting #7 and eventual national champion Connecticut at the DeanDome.

The rest of the year was mediocre. The Tar Heels were swept by Duke, although both games were close, and lost in the ACC tournament to Georgia Tech in the quarterfinals. Carolina was on the bubble, with the early ACC exit, but did finally in fact get back to the NCAA tournament. However, they received just a #6 seed and were quickly bounced by Texas in the second round.

However, this year Carolina is back with a vengeance, and ironically doing it primarily with Doherty's players. Based on the years, only five of the current Tar Heels are Williams recruits, and of those five only Marvin Williams is in the rotation.

In many ways, Carolina is the model program in America. It is never on NCAA probation, and from 1983-1995, it graduated 75% of its players (on par with Villanova, which has graduated EVERY player who has stayed for four years since 1975). The national average for the entire NCAA over the same period was 42%. A word about graduation rates: 75% is about as high as you're going to get, no matter how good the program, because there will always be guys who leave for non-academic reasons. For one thing, outgoing transfers (even if they have nothing to do with academic struggles) count against your average. To illustrate, Reggie Bryant, the last player to transfer from Villanova (after Wright's first season), counts against 'Nova's rate, even if he subsequently graduates from St. Louis. And at a program like Carolina, which always has players leave early for the NBA, that will happen as well. Its players rarely get involved in off-court troubles that embarrass the program or the university.

As Feinstein puts it, remember that this is a program that is so wedded to tradition that it still has a junior varsity squad (which plays against local junior and community colleges).

Carolina vs. Duke

In the words of ESPN's Mike Patrick, "separated by eleven miles.and a couple of shades of blue." Of course, during the Doherty Dark Ages the rivalry cooled a bit, at least in terms of national interest, because UNC had fallen so far below Duke. But it's back now, since the Tar Heels are back.

Part of Duke/Carolina is cultural. It's important to remember that it's not a fair fight in the state of North Carolina; as Duke graduate Feinstein puts it, "there are more UNC graduates in North Carolina than there are Duke graduates in the world. Duke could win ten consecutive national championships and still not begin to compete with Carolina as an obsession in the state." For those of you who haven't been fortunate enough to see Duke's gorgeous campus, known informally as a "Gothic Wonderland", think of it as a fortress - Fort Krzyzewski - a small but unassailable 2,000-acre enclave surrounded by a sea of light blue hostility. To oversimplify, the rap on Duke in North Carolina is that it's a carpetbagger school with too many Yankee students.

And the rivalry is undeniable. At least one of the two schools has been ranked in the last 118 meetings - all the way back to 1960.

Also, living in a pro sports town like Philadelphia, it's important to keep in mind how much media coverage and fan interest the schools in non-pro markets enjoy. (This is a point which I meant to mention in the New Mexico preview, a state with a booming population that also doesn't have pro teams.) The NFL, NBA and NHL franchises in North Carolina all arrived over the last decade and lag far behind college basketball in fan interest. ACC basketball in general, and UNC basketball in particular, rule the roost in the Carolinas, to a degree unimaginable in the Northeast. Imagine Eagles-level coverage, but if the Eagles were a powerhouse every year for decades

Even after a brief trip to Durham/Chapel Hill, and you understand why Billy Packer and his ilk seem to believe that ACC basketball is the only stuff worth mentioning. It is such a cozy, intimate area, very beautiful, that you could probably forget that the entire rest of the world exists if you live there.

Carolina Traditions - The Ram, The "White Phantoms", The Tar Heel Nickname, and Carolina Blue

According to the media guide:

"Carolina's mascot, a ram, is named Rameses. The Tar Heels have a ram for a mascot because in 1922, the best football player, Jack Merritt, was nicknamed the "Battering Ram". Vic Huggins, the head cheerleader in 1924, came up with the nickname, which was adopted for all of UNC's varsity teams. The Tar Heels were also known as the White Phantoms, a nickname they went by until the late 1940s."

Incredibly, Carolina's 336-page media guide doesn't specifically answer the question about how the unusual "Tar Heel" nickname came about, so I had to figure it out myself...

There are two serious explanations, according to a North Carolina newspaper site. Both long predate Carolina basketball...

One is from the American Revolution, when the British Navy needed vast quantities of tar and pitch to keep the ships afloat. You needed tar to seal up the cracks and wooden gaps in the wooden hulls so they wouldn't rot. And North Carolina produced more of this vital substance than any other colony. It was messy work, though, and the sticky stuff would often get stuck to the workers' heels, hence "Tar Heels".

Another is from the Civil War, and is more romantic. The lengthy quote from the News-Observer, the newspaper in the Research Triangle down there:

"During one of the fiercest clashes of the war, a unit of North Carolinians fought alone after its supporting column had been driven from the battlefield. A group of Virginia soldiers who had retreated asked in a condescending tone, "Any more tar down in the Old North State, boys?" The victorious troops responded quickly, "No, not a bit; old Jeff's bought it all up." "Is that so? What is he going to do with it?" the Virginians asked. "He is going to put it on you'ns heels to make you stick better in the next fight," came the reply. General Robert E. Lee, upon hearing of the incident said, "God bless the Tar Heel boys." Whatever the origin of their nickname, Tar Heels across the state are proud of it. And so is the basketball team!"

As for light blue, the media guide does answer that question, by noting that nobody knows precisely why that color was selected, but that:

"there is no doubt that the light blue hue is one of the most popular and instantly recognized colors in all of sports."

The cool argyle pattern on the jerseys wasn't added until 1991-92, by a fellow named Alexander Julian, whose first name probably indicates that the argyle was a tribute to not only his Scottish heritage but the many Scottish descendants in the state of North Carolina (there are a lot of Scots named "Alexander").

Villanova/North Carolina History

This is surprisingly long...

The schools have met a dozen times, with Carolina winning eight times. The first meeting came at Chapel Hill on December 29, 1955, with the Tar Heels winning 86-63. In the three NCAA tournament face-offs, the Tar Heels won in 1982 and 1991, while Villanova triumphed in 1985.

Unquestionably the top moment for Wildcat fans was in 1985, when the Team of Destiny upset #2 North Carolina, led by Brad Daugherty and Kenny Smith, 56-44, in the Elite Eight, to send 'Nova to the Final Four for the first time since 1971. I still remember - I was 11 at the time - seeing one of the players on the news that night, singing an impromptu rap song:

"We're going to the Final Four/North Carolina is sore" :)

At the time of course, as a #8 seed, it already would have been arguably Villanova's greatest season even if they hadn't won the whole thing. True, the 1971 team made it to the final before losing to UCLA, but at that point in 1985, Villanova had already beaten #9 Dayton on its home floor, #1 Michigan, #4 Maryland, and #2 North Carolina in four games.

Villanova remains the only non-ACC team to ever defeat Carolina twice in one season, although that accomplishment deserves an asterisk because so few teams have ever had the opportunity. The second game against Carolina that year, at the old Spectrum (this was the final year before then-Spectrum II, now the Wachovia Center, opened its doors, was probably the high-water mark for the Kerry Kittles-era teams in the mid-'90s, much in same way that the High-Water Mark took place for Robert E. Lee's Confederate army at Gettysburg.

The Wildcats, ranked third nationally, defeated #20 Carolina in the Maui Classic on Nov. 22, 1995, 77-75. But since Carolina was already on the schedule, the then- #10 Tar Heels visited the old Spectrum on Jan. 20, 1996. And the then-#7 Wildcats flattened them on national television, winning by 20, 76-56. Incredibly, it isn't included in the media guide's "Villanova's Greatest Games" section. Granted, it wasn't the greatest UNC team ever (it only made it to the second round of the NCAA tournament as a #6 seed). But the team did have Vince Carter, Antawn Jamison, and Jeff McInnis, among others. The schools have not met since then. The Wildcats would get no further than the Heels, as a #3 seed, falling to #6 Louisville in the second round in a highly disappointing finish.

In 1982, the teams met in the Elite Eight in Raleigh, and Carolina triumphed 70-60. They did, of course, have Michael Jordan, Sam Perkins, and James Worthy, and go on to defeat Patrick Ewing and Georgetown to win the whole thing. 'Nova had the freshmen that would eventually win the national title three years later, but they weren't the main points (although Pinckney and McClain did start on that team, according to the media guide.) The 'Cats had John Pinone and Stewart Granger to lead the way.

In 1991, ironically, the two teams met in the second round in Syracuse, just as they will Friday night. Carolina, the top seed, won easily, 84-69, with such talent as Rick Fox, Eric Montross, and George Lynch. 'Nova countered with Lance Miller, Chris Walker, Greg Woodard, Marc Dowdell, and Arron Bain.

Please check out Part 3 of the Preview...

The Guide to Villanova/Florida - NCAA Tournament Second Round

To the Wildcat faithful-

Wondering about the Gators? A short sketch of Villanova's next opponent in the second round of the NCAA tournament. Meet the Gators...

This is entitled "The Guide to VU/Florida", in marked contrast to "The Ultimate Guide to VU/New Mexico", because of time constraints, being the second-round guide. It will be a lot shorter than the ones for New Mexico. Should Villanova triumph, an "Ultimate Guide" to the next opponent will appear sometime next week.

My personal biases...

I'm going to try to be as objective as I can, but in my opinion, schools like Florida - Southern football factories - are representative of everything that is wrong with college athletics. Although to its credit, over the last seven years - the Billy Donovan regime - Florida's academic awards dwarf those of its SEC rivals; the Gators have nearly twice as many SEC Honor Roll Awards as Mississippi State, its closest competitor. On Selection Sunday, I was really happy when we drew New Mexico in the first game, because it's an interesting program with devoted fans, from far away, that we never get a chance to see much. And I was really disappointed when Ohio U. couldn't pull off the upset against Florida:

not only because now we have a tougher second-round opponent, not only because I would have liked to have seen the underdog win, not only because it would have been a great comeback, but because I would much rather have researched and written about Ohio U.'s program than a football factory like Florida, whose basketball team is on CBS all the time anyway.

Every year, I root for Florida in football against Florida State, because I hate Florida State, but that's about it. In the Steve Spurrier, Fun-and-Gun era, they were entertaining to watch. (BTW - That's a serious rivalry... I once read a story about a Florida shopping mall Santa Claus, a Seminole fan in civilian life, who was fired for - with a straight face - telling some poor little boy who wanted some Florida gear for Christmas, "Gee... Santa doesn't like Gator fans... you shouldn't expect anything this year." The guy might have been right - Santa must love FSU, and that's why they get all those shoes every year. FSU stands for "Free Shoes University" for a reason... but I digress.. :)

It's not a coincidence that I begin a story about Florida with football, because football is the unquestioned king in Gainesville, Florida, and for the U of F community. Basketball ranks a distant second in popularity, and Gators baseball has its fans, too. (Cynics might contend that Florida hoops may also rank behind spring football and, especially in this Internet era, football recruiting in the U of F sporting hierarchy :).

Ironically, in light of the fact that it's the permanent second banana, Florida hoops has been pretty good over the last few years. Win some bar bets with this one:

Name the four teams that have been a #6 seed or higher, in each of the last seven NCAA tournaments.

Duke, Kentucky, Kansas - all likely suspects, and all correct. And then, not Syracuse or Arizona (the two I'd have guessed - but...

Florida. (Granted, the seeds have been lower than the other three - #6, #5, #3, #5, #2, #5, #4. But still...)

Not bad company for a program that had never even qualified for the NCAA tournament until 1987, much less won it. Over the last 18 years, the Gators have made up for lost time, though: a dozen appearances. Furthermore, they have enjoyed a lot of success, going 17-11 in the tournament and reaching the Sweet 16 four times. The centerpiece achievements were reaching the Final Four in 1994 and then again in 2000 (as a #5 seed) reaching the title game before losing to a superior Michigan State team led by the "Flintstones" and Mateen Cleaves. They've developed a rivalry with Kentucky, as although the two schools are geographically very distant, they have jockeyed for pre-eminence within the Southeast Conference's East Division. (They have true rivalries, as in the SEC you play your division rivals twice every year and the other division's teams only once.) One can only imagine what the typical Wildcat fan, with its glorious tradition, thinks of Gator fans..

This year's team

The Gators finished the season hot, with a 24-7 record and winning the SEC tournament championship; they finished 12-4 in the SEC regular season. It was good enough for second place in the East Division, two games behind division leader Kentucky. But the Gators beat their archrival Wildcats twice in eight days over the last two weeks. (Hopefully all their anti-Wildcat luck has been exhausted...) They currently are ranked #16 in the AP poll, and were, after all, seeded higher than Villanova, as a #4.

Out-of-conference, they've been pretty weak. The schedule was just OK, and they don't have a win over anyone good. Their best win is over Donovan's alma mater, Providence (a 18 point home triumph). After that, they doubled up Eastern Kentucky, 98-49, which looks more impressive now after the Colonels qualified for the NCAA tournament as a #15 seed and fought in-state rival Kentucky hard for a while, before losing by just eight. They played their in-state football rivals, FSU and Miami, but lost to both ACC schools. Their best loss is a four-point defeat to Louisville. Probably when the schedule was drawn up, Donovan thought he'd have a RPI powerhouse, but Providence and FSU both had terrible seasons, sinking to the bottom of their conferences. Most of their other games were against Sunshine State cupcakes, all of whom they cruised past.

Within the SEC, though, they were good. They did very well against the other SEC tourney qualifiers, finishing 6-3 against them. They beat UK two out of three, two wins over Alabama (a 31 point win at home and then again by six in the SEC tourney), split with LSU, lost at Mississippi State, but then beat the Bulldogs in the tournament. Three of their four SEC losses were against NCAA qualifiers, the only bad one being a home loss to Tennessee in overtime, and the Gators won the subsequent game at Knoxville. (Tennessee had a sufficiently bad year that its coach, Buzz Peterson, got fired this week.)

Billy Donovan likes to use a ton of players, way too many to keep track of, and no starter averages more than 30 minutes a game as a result. (Gotta spread the playing time around...) He's got 12 guys that average at least nine minutes a game.

Billy Donovan

The steward of the program's most recent successes is a young coach who, as a guard, led Providence to the Final Four in 1987, the same year Florida debuted in the tournament, by the name of Billy Donovan. Rick Pitino, way back then, made his rise on the national scene by taking the Cinderella Friars to the Final Four as a #12 seed (the lowest, before or since, to ever get that far) and his player Donovan became one of his proteges, and arguably his most successful one. As a player, Donovan was a first-team All-Big East honoree his senior year, and was named Most Outstanding Player of the Regional the Friars won to reach the Final Four. Donovan was an assistant to Pitino at Kentucky, became the head coach at Marshall for two years, and then arrived in Gainesville for the 1996-97 season, replacing Lon Kruger. His first year, the Gators struggled. His second year, they reached the NIT, and beginning in 1999, they have made the tournament every year and never been seeded lower than #6.

Donovan is part of two very exclusive but overlapping fraternities. One is coaches who have both played and coached in a Final Four - there are just six, including Dean Smith (who played for Kansas and coached at North Carolina) and the odious Bob Knight (who played for Ohio State and coached at Indiana, now at Texas Tech). The other consists of two guys: Donovan and one other guy, Dick Harp, who played for Kansas and also coached at Kansas in the 1950s. The pair are the only coaches ever to play AND be an assistant coach AND a head coach in the Final Four (Donovan was an assistant on Pitino's 1993 Kentucky Final Four team). Harp played for the Jayhawks, and was also an assistant coach and head coach at Kansas during Final Four appearances, apparently.

Donovan, who will turn just 40 in May, was a white-hot commodity in 2000. He had taken a ridiculously young and talented team to the title game, as a #5 seed, and was the subject of a great deal of sniping from other coaches, especially SEC rivals, for what charitably might be described as a relaxed attitude toward NCAA recruiting regulations. Since 1998, Donovan has signed no fewer than NINE McDonald's All-Americans: Mike Miller, Teddy Dupay, Donnell Harvey, Brett Nelson, David Lee, Jason White, Kwame Brown (who never played for him), Anthony Roberson, and Cory Brewer. Lee, Roberson and Brewer are all current members of the team. (Villanova's Jason Fraser was also a McDonald's All-American, but his injuries have slowed his development.)

Donovan's youth, his dazzling recruiting successes, and the tantalizing promise of future national titles seemed to indicate that the next Rick Pitino was indeed lurking in - of all places - the football-addled swamps of northern Florida. Donovan became overexposed in the national media, and his prominent widow's peak became almost as familiar as Dick Nixon's.

But you don't hear about Donovan as much anymore. Mainly because his star has receded quite a bit, as his Gators - despite their undeniable blue-chip talent - have unceremoniously washed out to sea in each of the last four tournaments. From 2001-04 - despite all those high seeds - the Gators managed to win a grand total of two games in four appearances, and did not reach the Sweet 16 at all. And in 1999, they were upset by Gonzaga, as a #6 in the Sweet 16.

All in all, that's a lot of losing to lower seeds over a seven year period, and there's been some rumbling in Gainesville about Donovan's inability to win consistently (or nowadays, at all :) in the Big Dance. He's been in the NCAA tournament seven straight years now. But outside of the 2000 run, he has NEVER won a game against another power conference team in the NCAAs, and his career NCAA record is just 5-5. (It's 10-6 overall, including yesterday's victory.) During his Florida tenure, his non-2000 NCAA victories have come against Penn, Weber State, Western Kentucky, Sam Houston State, and Ohio University, all lower-seeded programs dwarfed by Florida's size. And he has upset, white-jerseyed losses to Gonzaga (1999), Creighton (2002), and Manhattan (2004). Far more than any other program, the Gators have now become a staple of CBS's inspirational Cinderella montages to open its tournament broadcasts, but on the wrong end - as the foils.

In light of this history, there was likely a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth in Florida when #13 seed Ohio U. made its charge on Friday afternoon, after Florida had led by 20 with 12 minutes to play. (Here we go again...) And the Gators were truly LUCKY to escape yet another upset defeat at the hands of a Cinderella. The Bobcats threw away that game in the final two minutes. They missed a dunk which would have given them a two-point LEAD, they committed an unforced turnover, and Florida then lucked out when a short airball dropped into a Gator's arms under the basket, and he was able to convert a traditional three-point play. Had Florida fallen again, it would have been its second straight first-round exit. It also would have been its fourth upset loss in seven years, and far and away the most humiliating one.

Of course, Donovan would likely scoff at the notion that he's struggled in the tournament. He would - accurately - point out that in 2000, he beat a veritable murderer's row of traditional power teams - Duke, Illinois, Oklahoma State, and North Carolina - with a 5 seed. (His critics would reply that he was lucky to get out of the first round, when #12 Butler took them into overtime and it took a miracle shot for the Gators to pull it out.)

Regardless of the identity of the coach, Florida has a lot of the elements in place for a successful program, with the two exceptions of being in football's long shadow and the lack of a pre-Reagan-era winning tradition. Namely: great weather, fun place to go to school, proximity to talent, on-campus arena, state school money, power conference membership, etc. Donovan's done well in the SEC and he'll always have that 2000 title run, but if he's ever going to approach the status of his mentor Pitino, he needs to at least make a deep run every once in a while. (Or at minimum, stop losing to the underdogs everyone loves and becoming favorite fodder for CBS's video editors.)

The clear implication of Donovan's critics: Donovan is the personified cliche of a young, flashy, sophisticated Northeastern coach who talks a great game on the recruiting circuit, but can't coach come game day, on the bench.

Of course, all this spells good news for Villanova. Clearly, Donovan's Florida teams have historically struggled against teams that are unfamiliar in the NCAA tournament. And Villanova's talent, unlike many of those mid-major teams, can go toe-to-toe with the Gators'. In a battle of basketball IQ, I'd take Jay Wright over Billy Donovan every day of the week and twice on Sunday (especially THIS Sunday :)

Villanova Wildcats/Florida Gators ties

The only significant one is Matt Walsh, a native of Holland, Pa., a pleasant suburb in Bucks County, and graduate of Germantown Academy, the same school that produced Villanova's own Alvin Williams. Walsh has played a lot of pickup games against the current Wildcats and "knows Wright well". He's the Gators' second leading scorer.

Very few others that I could imagine. There was of course, the late, great Al E. Gator's on Lancaster Avenue in Haverford, a popular, spacious Main Line hangout back in the day (the late '90s). Gator's offered decent food in a casual environment and lots of big screen TVs for the game, but the place was big enough that there was pretty much something for everybody. (Trying to remember if they had DJ's, dancing there - anybody remember? I think so...)

Gator's met its demise, unfortunately, due to its massive size. The parcel of real estate was so valuable, that a cash-cow casual restaurant simply wasn't profitable enough, for the lucky devil who owned the property. So, in early 1997, it was announced that Gator's would officially close on March 18, one day after St. Patrick's Day (trying to milk one last bit of cash out of the Main Line bar crowd before selling out!) - and that it would be demolished to make room for a Lexus dealership. If you're into $50,000 vehicles, you probably liked the change, but if not, too bad. Gator's the night it closed was a fun scene. Mobbed, but fun. And so now it lives on as a Lexus dealership.

But seriously... very few. The Wildcat legend Howard Porter, star of the 1971 Final Four team that lost to UCLA in the final, was from Sarasota, Florida. I don't remember anyone else of any prominence from the Sunshine State. Villanova and Florida have only clashed twice, as they played a home-and-home series during the Kerry Kittles era. On December 22, 1993, Florida won at the Pavilion, 85-77, and on January 14, 1995, Villanova won at the O'Connell Center, 72-70.