You wanted the best. You got the best. The all-North Carolina team.
First, a few notes.
I picked teams that could play together -- a point guard, a shooting guard, two forwards and a center -- not just the five best players, followed by the next five.
Field goal percentage is often a misleading statistic because it includes 3-point percentage. I remove 3-pointers from the equation and use 2-point percentage. See the Stephen Curry entry.
This is a down season for the North Carolina teams, mostly because it's a down season for Duke, N.C. State and Wake Forest. Another reason is the talent in the state is young. Of the 10 players selected, three are freshmen and two are sophomores. There is only one senior.
First team
Tyler Hansbrough, North Carolina, forward, sophomore
18.6 points, 7.9 rebounds, 1.2 assists, 53.8 2-point percentage
Hansbrough is a fine player, but that's not the whole story:
1. Hansbrough was a 21-year-old sophomore this season (born: Nov. 3, 1985). So he was two years older than many of the players in his class and the same age as some juniors and seniors. That's one reason why he was one of the best freshman of all time last season -- he was 20 years old.
There are a couple explanations for this. The first is his birthday is in November, and the cut-off date in many school systems is in October. The second, according to my source, is he went from a public school to a private one in first grade and repeated that grade.
2. Hansbrough was not a unanimous all-ACC first-team selection, no matter what the ACC office tells you. Patrick Stevens of The Washington Times knows better.
Kyle Hines, UNC-Greensboro, forward, junior
20.9 points, 9.0 rebounds, 0.9 assists, 56.0 2-point percentage
Southern Conference player of the year.
Brandan Wright, North Carolina, center, freshman
14.6 points, 6.1 rebounds, 1.0 assists, 65.2 2-point percentage
Stephen Curry, Davidson, shooting guard, freshman
21.5 points, 4.6 rebounds, 2.8 assists, 40.8 3-point percentage
Stephen (pronounced Stef-un) wasn't offered a scholarship by any ACC school. Virginia Tech, where he wanted to go, offered him a chance to walk on. That's it. Pat Forde of ESPN.com tells the whole story.
Curry shot 53.5 percent from 2-point range, 40.8 percent from 3-point range and 85.5 percent from the free throw line for a total shooting percentage of 179.8.
For a frame of reference, J.J. Redick shot 175.7 as a freshman, 181.8 as a sophomore, 175.6 as a junior and 180.5 as a senior.
Jason Richards, Davidson, point guard, junior
13.5 points, 3.8 rebounds, 7.3 assists, 3.1 turnovers
Richards is second in the nation in assists, first among players in the NCAA tournament.
Second team
Arizona Reid, High Point, forward, junior
21.0 points, 9.5 rebounds, 1.9 assists, 52.8 2-point percentage
Great name, great game.
Ben McCauley, N.C. State, forward, sophomore
14.7 points, 6.9 rebounds, 3.3 assists, 59.5 2-point percentage
McCauley edges out Brandon Costner of State, Josh McRoberts of Duke, Vladimir Kuljanin of UNC-Wilmington and Jeremy Clayton of Appalachian State.
Kyle Visser, Wake Forest, center, senior
17.0 points, 7.4 rebounds, 0.6 assists, 58.8 2-point percentage
Visser really improved. He had not averaged more than 5.0 points a game before this season.
Ty Lawson, North Carolina, point guard, freshman
10.5 points, 2.9 rebounds, 5.6 assists, 2.1 turnovers
DeMarcus Nelson, Duke, shooting guard, junior
14.1 points, 5.4 rebounds, 2.0 assists, 53.5 2-point percentage
7 comments:
Nice work on this!
Hard to argue with the first team (especially since I didn't follow the other teams as closely); however, I'd have to go with Costner over McCauley on the second team. I'm guessing you based all of this on regular and post-season results. If so, I think Costner would get the edge over McCauley.
By the way, I think it's great that you're highlighting guys from UNCG, Davidson, etc. As we've seen from the NCAAs and the NIT even over the past few years, there are good players at so many schools across the nation, not just the "big boys." N.C. is blessed to have some great under-the-radar-type players. Thanks for mentioning them.
And, WOW! I had no idea about the "unanimous" clause. That's unreal. Could you imagine if we used that same type of logic in voting for, say, President?
Right, now we can honestly question any unanimous player in ACC history.
That's just unreal. I had no idea.
One more thing I was going to include in that post:
The New York Times did a great piece on Kay Yow, who is much sicker than anyone knows, according to the piece.
It seems like they had great access.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/18/sports/ncaabasketball/18yow.html?_r=1&ex=117488&oref=slogin
It doesn't look like that link showed up correctly.
http://www.nytimes.com/
2007/03/18/sports/
ncaabasketball/18yow.html?_r=1&ex=117488&oref=slogin
The NYTimes piece was phenomenal. And, like you, I don't think anyone realized just how bad it is for Yow. We were watching some of her news conference last night, and my wife -- who hadn't really seen photos or footage of Yow lately -- asked if it was really bad. It's really sad. It sure doesn't sound good.
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