North Carolina Tar Heels: Survive Davidson without Berry
The North Carolina Tar Heels have some work to do before facing Tennessee and Kentucky.
The task for the North Carolina Tar Heels was simple: prove that the team could win without Joel Berry. The biggest potential problem for the Tar Heels this year is the same biggest potential problem that the team had had in recent campaigns. Could the 2005 team survive without Raymond Felton? Fortunately it was two minutes in the Sweet Sixteen. Can the Heels survive losing Kendall Marshall or Marcus Paige? Not really.
The Davidson game was the test to see if the Heels could survive without Berry. The results were kind of concerning. Nate Britt started the game but had no offense to contribute. Seventh Woods, though talented, is just not ready yet to be a point guard. Stilman White is just a time filler.
Berry provides scoring punch, tone setting, and defense. Davidson guard Jackson Gibbs had no problem filling up the basket with thirty points in Berry’s absence.
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Davidson also prevented the ball from going inside as much since the Tar Heel bigs were more obvious threats in the absence of Berry. Isaiah Hicks managed twelve points, but Luke Maye was the second most effective post and he played only in the first half.
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The team would have been in more trouble if Justin Jackson had not awoken to assume the offensive burden. Davidson had no answer for the 6’8” wing. He put on a shooting display to get to a career high twenty-seven points. The fact remains: if the Tar Heels can get Berry and Jackson over twenty points consistently then they have much less stress in their lives.
The Tar Heels got out of the game with an 83-74 win. Yet the biggest lesson seems to be to get Berry back as soon as possible. And keep Jackson hot if possible.