What’s now being engrained in this team’s image?

The Tar Heels lost to Miami. Another opportunity at either a quad one or a quad two win by the boards. Carolina is now 0 for 8 in quad one games. That would not have been a quad one win at this point. Miami is not a top 30 team. Although, they might be now.

And Brendan Marks from the Athletic joins us on the Adam Gold Show at Brendan R Marks on Twitter. Alright, so Carolina still didn't shoot well. They bottled up Armando Bacot inside. But is this mechanical for them or is this somewhat a psychological problem? I think it's both. You know, I think that the mechanical problems are probably causing some sort of mental blockage. And like, you know, you mentioned North Carolina didn't shoot well again. That's just the reality of who this team is. It's, you know, if you want to call it roster construction, lack of development, progression, whatever label you want to put on it. This is a team that is barely making 30.6% of its threes.

It's 330th nationally. Going into last night, that was the 10th worst three point percentage of any high major team. And frankly, right now, because of that, and because this has been, you know, such a season long issue that is frankly sort of ingrained in this team's identity at this point. I do think that you see some mental blockages.

You know, Pete Nance had a number of seemingly apparent looks last night from three where he visibly hesitated. And if you're at this point in the season and you're still having these issues, I can't say that I blame them for feeling that way. So certainly North Carolina has issues of both varieties.

And, you know, I think the shooting is sort of the common denominator between those. Well, maybe they have the exact antidote they need in front of them coming up on Sunday in NC State. Yeah. I mean, if there is a chance for North Carolina to get right, like it's got to be there, it has to be. And I think this is a team that obviously you look at North Carolina's resume right now.

And the great irony in all of this bubble talk, are they going to make the tournament? Is that the only pretty much, you know, the best way on the schedule right now is the NC State with the North Carolina needs NC State to do well for the sake of its own resume. But, you know, that is going to be a tough place to play. And look, there are essentially three games that still matter for North Carolina this season in the regular season. You've got at State and you've got Virginia at home. You've got Duke at home to end of the regular season. In my eyes, North Carolina doesn't win at least two of those games. They go into the ACC tournament in Greensboro needing to do some work still to prove that they're deserving of being in the tournament. And if they lose all three of those games, then it's going to be a very, very steep uphill for this team to make it into much madness.

Brennan Marks from the Athletic is joining us here on the Adam Gold Show. If Carolina only wins one of those three, at State, home again, let's just say they win the Duke game. Because that's probably their biggest opportunity. I think their best chance, or if not this weekend, this weekend, but if they only win the Duke game, wouldn't it be fair to say they probably need to win the ACC tournament? They would still have zero quad one wins. Duke's not going to be a quad one win in the Smith Center.

The other two opportunities are quad one at State and home against Virginia. So wouldn't it be fair to say they probably have to win the tournament in Greensboro? Yeah, I think they would at least have to make it to the finals because just the process of doing that would almost certainly give them an opportunity against another quad one team. Maybe they get, you know, a Virginia or Miami again. And this would be considered a quote, unquote, neutral court. So that would rank out differently. But yeah, I mean, if they only win that Duke game, if they lose to NC State, they lose to Virginia at home.

And again, we're not even talking about some of those other filler games. You know, we're not even talking about the Florida States and the Notre Dame's of the world. You cannot afford to lose those. Yeah, it's it is the reality of the situation. And like, I think the fact that Armando Bate is saying last night, I'm 100 percent worried on a level of worry. It sort of tells you that that UNC even understands how precarious this position is. It's you know, it's sort of unfathomable given where this team was back in like November.

But it's the reality of the situation. And yeah, you know, they only win that Duke game. You need to at least make the championship game in Greensboro to have a real argument for being included in the tournament. Brendan Marks from The Athletic is joining us here. What is because you're closer, way closer to it than I. I just watched them on TV. What what has surprised you? My guess is in a negative way about the way this season has played out.

Yeah, so I think that obviously the shooting is not there, but that is not a surprise to me. Even going back to, you know, April, May, when North Carolina was still sort of figuring out, OK, what are we doing here with Gigi Jackson? What are we doing with Pete Nance?

What are we looking at in the portal? Even then, I was sort of the mindset that, you know, you were going to need sizable, sizable contributions from three point range from Arjay Davis, Caleb Love, even down the roster guys. Leaky Black, Puff Johnson, DeMarco done like those guys were going to have to take gigantic strides, three point shooting wise to make up for Brady Mann can make this offense viable like it was during the postseason last year. The thing that has surprised me, I think, is just the fact that we are now this far into the season, mid-February, and teams basically have the book on North Carolina.

What you do is you front Armando Baycott, you double him, you have the help side defender sag really far off. Basically, you dare North Carolina to make shots. And the idea that North Carolina has an All-American big man who can't even get the ball to half the time. You know, I know that Armando picking up four fouls in a five minute stretch of game time last night didn't help. But the fact that you have one of the best players in the country and you can't even get him the ball sometimes because you are shooting that poorly. That is not something that I envision this season for sure.

And I think that is sort of the quandary that North Carolina is stuck with right now. We have this guy, he is our best player, but right now our other deficiencies are preventing him from doing what he does. He is their best chance for winning games, he is their best chance for consistency, and right now they can't even use him because of their shortcomings in other areas. The weird thing about this team, Pete Nance shot nearly 47% from three point range last year. Now that could be the outlier season because in his two previous seasons he was not great. He was around 34% the year before that and he was I think under 30% maybe even as a sophomore at Northwestern. But he is under 30%. I just wonder if poor shooting is contagious or if you know that man we need to make shots if you just put so much pressure on yourself that you just can't relax.

Yeah I mean and I think that a lot of people you know there is a lot of value in the context which nobody wants to hear. But you bring up a great point about Pete. You know he was a 45.7% three point shooter last year but you got to go look at the volume. He only had 92 attempts.

You know that is basically as many attempts as Brady Manick took in the NCAA tournament alone. So you know the sample size was not there and yeah you have seen him regress obviously. I think it is very fair to wonder how much his back is bothering him. He seems stiff on the floor.

It doesn't seem like he is comfortable. But the other thing is you look at the other guys on the roster like I think people remember the big shots that Caleb made during the postseason last year. And they think oh he is a good three point shooter. Like this guy was one of the most inefficient players in division one history as a freshman. Made 26.6%. Made 36% last year but on ridiculous volume. And now he is sort of right in the middle of those.

Right about 30%. So it is not just a Pete Nance problem. You know this is just a team that hasn't seen the growth that we would have expected to see.

There hasn't been you know somebody off the bench who has been able to come in a la Kerwin Walton a few years ago and hit triples. And yeah you know when you don't have the shots like Armando Bacon said it is impossible to win. I certainly think that you know the disaster of it all is sort of bearing down on this team. I think that they you know sort of sense what is happening to them. And it is almost like watching a train wreck you don't know if they are going to be able to stop it in real time or not. Again it is just a wild thing to consider based on where this team was in November. It is also really hard.

I want to ask you one question about Duke in a second. But it is also really hard when you know it is not working on one end of the floor. It is hard for these guys to not carry it to the other end. And there is just too many times where their defense just they don't finish off possessions. And I am not even talking about with you know allowing offensive rebounds.

They just lose their focus late in shot clocks and guys end up with layups. At Progressive we know there is nothing like the feeling of riding your motorcycle with your buddies on the open road. It is a potent cocktail of thrills, laughter and pure adrenaline. A feeling that would be impossible to recreate on the radio. Until now hit it sound effects guy. I am real proud of you son. Wow that was terrible.

Our apologies for even trying. Quote with Progressive and see if you could save with America's number one motorcycle insurer. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. Venture X from Capital One is the travel card for people always asking.

Where next? You earn 10x miles on hotels and rental cars and 5x miles on flights booked through Capital One Travel. And 2x miles on everything else you buy with Venture X. Plus receive premium travel benefits like access to over 1300 airport lounges. The Venture X card from Capital One. What's in your wallet? Terms apply.

See Capital One dot com for details. Yep they 100% do and the sad part about that is that on the whole defensively North Carolina is not bad. I mean Ken Palms got him at third in the conference and conference only defensive efficiency. You know right behind Virginia and Clemson.

So like there is growth there. Leaky Black I think is probably going to be you know one of the all ACC defenders could be the ACC defender of the year. I mean Armando Baker I think has improved as a rim protector.

RJ Davis and Caleb Love. You know they've been on and off but it's exactly what you're saying. It's late in the shot clock. It's three seconds to go. Four seconds to go.

Five seconds to go. And it seems like there are so many of these long exaggerated close outs. Where teams just pump fake, drive by, get wide open shots or layups.

And that's the king that killed. That's what killed North Carolina last night in Miami. Was those late shot clock makes and not being able to string together as soon as the devil stops. At Brendan R Marks on Twitter before I let you go. Blue Devils might be feeling sorry for themselves about Saturday.

What's your take on is John Shire too nice? How are they recovering from all of that even though they turned it over 22 times against Virginia. Which is like turning it over 60 times against some other team. Right and allowed 42 points in the paint. So you know you can and also you know I do not think that Duke is getting any sympathy from anybody anywhere.

No of course not. Or around the country in terms of calls. But like listen John Shire I think as we sort of heard yesterday from him on the ACC teleconference like he's still peeved. He's still hot about this whole ordeal. And he's got a right to be because that was the statement win that this Duke team needed. Like you know beating Miami was nice. You know having beaten Xavier back in Portland in a non-conference schedule. That win just continues to get better and better.

But elsewhere up and down this you know resume. You know Pitt is all right. North Carolina is all right.

Iowa is all right. But like there's not really that like wow we beat somebody who really has a chance to win the whole thing. And that's what the Virginia game represented.

So as far as his Shire too nice. I've heard a lot of people say something along the lines of you know he should not have let them play overtime. He you know that's ridiculous. Like he's going to let them play the thing that I do think that he probably should have done. And this is part of learning what you need to do as a head coach is he should not have let his team go out there for overtime.

Until he had complete carry clarity on what the rule was. There is no reason why he or Tony Bennett or all of the players involved in Saturday night's game. Should be going to the postgame news conferences and saying we don't actually know what the call is. That that's the part that to me is unacceptable.

So if I'm him I think in the future you look and you learn you go listen. We might be going overtime. I might disagree with that call. That's fine. But you've got to at least give me a solid reason for why we're doing this now.

You're not giving me a reason it's not an option. So again it's it's he's a first time head coach. It's something he's going to learn.

It's something that he's developing. But you know that he is not the reason why they lost that game. It's the 22 turnovers the 42 points in the paint. Right. You know as the ACC admitted it's a blown call.

Yeah. The ACC statement though. Like I don't know who the referees really called the foul on. But in the statement. The foul was not on the guy the ACC recognized.

If anybody found Kyle Filipowski it was Reese Beekman. Not done. I just don't understand. Like it made me believe that nobody watched the video. Yeah. And watching the replay like you know it was just sort of incredible to me that you know five seconds after the play in question there are you know a thousand and one videos and screenshots at the moment on social media.

And the officials had no idea and even five hours later we don't know what we're doing but like come on guys like I love the ACC I root for the ACC like I am a full ACC stand and Saturday in every form was not a conference's finest moment. No it was a cluster. Brendan R. Marks you're the man. I appreciate your time. Thank you so much. We'll do it again soon. Absolutely. Appreciate you having me.

You got it. The Venture X card from Capital One gives you premium travel benefits. Perfect for seeing Taylor Swift The Heiress Tour presented by Capital One.

Oh I do love her. Earn five times miles on flights and 10 times miles on hotels through Capital One travel. Enjoy your stay in suite 13. Whoa 13? That's Taylor's lucky number. The Venture X card from Capital One. What's in your wallet? Terms apply. See capitalone.com for details.