Who’s ready for some late night basketball?
The Tar Heels will travel out to California this week to face off against Stanford on Wednesday, and then afterwards they will make their way to Berkeley to take on Cal. While they were able to avoid having to travel out west last year, they were not as lucky this time around. Interestingly, another ACC squad heads out west and they effectively swap teams in this setup, and Carolina’s travel partner is…Duke. It’s probably not that much of a surprise.
Let’s look at three things to watch for for this first Bay Area Contest.
Bay Area two-step
Look, even if both Stanford and Cal were horrible teams, they get a significant advantage in the ACC when teams come out to their home courts. It’s one thing to travel to Dallas, Notre Dame, or Boston. It’s another thing to have to fly cross-country, play in a different time zone, and then stay in that time zone for a few days. It’s a longer time away from home than if you play in the NCAA Tournament, and you are playing in an unfriendly gym instead of a big neutral court.
If you want to know just how difficult a task this is for Carolina, know that both of these games will be Quad 1 games, and R.L. Bynum broke down just how poorly ACC teams have done making this trip. As he notes, though, women’s coach Courtney Banghart was one of the few to accomplish the sweep last year for either the men or the women, so hopefully some folks in the Smith Center basketball offices contacted the staff over in Carmichael to pick up some pointers.
It also wouldn’t be surprising if both gyms weren’t as big a home court advantage as they would hope. Carolina fans are everywhere, and west coast Tar Heels have likely been relishing a chance to see their team up close. We’ll get an idea of how much they are in force with this game.
Caleb’s Freshman Wall
We’re starting to see what happens you’re a player with the most upside on a team and your opponent works the entirety of their defense around you. Caleb Wilson had arguably his worst game against SMU a week ago, and then on Saturday it looked like he had recovered to an incredible level by almost getting a 20/10 stat line before halftime. However as that first half was ending, he was starting to look worn down, and then the second half he was mostly quiet. He even got caught in a double team and turned it over, giving Wake a chance late.
This is all part of the learning process for Wilson and it should be clear now how teams are going to try to defend him. Stanford has the height to do it as six guys on the roster are 6’8” and above, but two of the biggest threats Chisom Okpara and AJ Royosy are “old,” and get after it on the boards. There’s very little doubt that Stanford has the talent down low to continue to test Wilson, and for Carolina to be successful he’ll need to know how to handle it.
Success from three
The other part of the strategy that teams have employed against Carolina in the last couple of games has been to launch it from deep. The good news for Carolina is that Stanford currently 14th in the league at 33.5% from behind the arc which is one spot behind…the Tar Heels, who are 13th in the league shooting 33.7% from deep.
Both Wake and SMU were better in the league than Carolina and they took full advantage of it. Where Carolina’s advantage here, though, may be that the style of play they have leaned into this season with Veesaar and Wilson on the court. One of the things you worry about with long travel is legs not getting set well enough to be able to get the lift and make shots. However, as Carolina has had success much closer to the basket, there’s reason to think that style will travel. Keep in mind that Stanford is also coming back from their own cross-country trip for this game.
Another thing with potential to help? Stanford is near dead last in the league in opposing field goal percentage. At 44.8%, only Florida State at 45.3% has allowed better shooting. For as rough as it seems like it’s been for Carolina they are still second in the league at 38.3%. So, yeah it may be reductive to say “the difference will be if Stanford makes shots.” But, well, Stanford has to make shots to really have a chance. A slow start combined with the usual production for the Tar Heels could spell trouble.
