Heels Fall to d00k in the 2011 ACC Tournament
or:
d00k Sucks

Argh. A very painful game to watch. Carolina never really showed up today. As in their other two tournament games, they came out listless and got down big. This time, they couldn't climb back.

One could lament many things about this game, but a lengthy discussion, of, say, d00k's ubiquitous (illegal, bullshit, game-altering) hand-checking might seem churlish at this point... So see previous discussions of that...  The loss is unfortunate, but not entirely unexpected. For all their virtues, these Heels have a lot of growing up to do, and routinely getting down by double digits in the first 5 minutes of games is something they're going to have to get past if they're going to move it to the next level.

This may very well be my favorite Carolina team ever...but they're certainly not the best Carolina team ever, nor even close to it. They're great kids, they're exciting to watch, and it's been great to see them improve...but they never quite got all the kinks worked out. However, like last year, there are simply no great teams in college hoops this year, so the championship is largely there for whoever manages to survive the tournament. It's not impossible that these Heels might suddenly get over their immaturity, but not likely...  Still, it'll be fun to get to watch them for a couple more games...