
{"id":15666,"date":"2011-02-03T12:31:35","date_gmt":"2011-02-03T17:31:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/?p=15666"},"modified":"2011-02-03T14:53:43","modified_gmt":"2011-02-03T19:53:43","slug":"heels-win-as-they-grow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/2011\/02\/03\/heels-win-as-they-grow\/","title":{"rendered":"Heels win as they grow"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/2011\/01\/27\/tar-heels-headed-north-or-south\/landreth-mug-11\/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-15498\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/01\/landreth-mug1.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"landreth-mug\" width=\"100\" height=\"134\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-15498\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/01\/landreth-mug1.jpg 100w, https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/01\/landreth-mug1-84x113.jpg 84w, https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/01\/landreth-mug1-59x80.jpg 59w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 100px) 100vw, 100px\" \/><\/a><br \/>\n<strong>By Eddy Landreth<br \/>\n<\/strong><em>Staff Writer<\/em><br \/>\nNo team sits idle.<br \/>\nThey are either moving forward in their progress or slipping. The ideal scenario is to learn while winning, rather than struggling to find confidence and learn while losing.<br \/>\nEntering Tuesday\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s game at Boston College (which was played after the deadline for this column), Carolina was 15-5 overall and 5-1 in the ACC standings and in that enviable position of finding ways to win while growing.<br \/>\n\u00e2\u20ac\u0153That is a credit to how much potential we have as a team,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d sophomore forward John Henson said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The way we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re winning, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m just waiting for that breakout game where we play really well. We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re still trying to get that perfect game, that great game.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<br \/>\nHenson is one of the main reasons the Tar Heels continue to win. Ever since he moved closer to the basket near the end of last season, his progress has been steady and upward. On Jan. 29 against N.C. State, Henson blocked (at least) seven shots, scored 16 points and grabbed 16 rebounds. The young man gets better every day at using his amazing wingspan to his advantage and that of his team.<br \/>\nUNC\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Tyler Zeller is a big man himself, checking in at 7 feet, but his wingspan is not quite that of Henson\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s. Zeller enjoys and admires the impact big John is having around the bucket.<br \/>\n\u00e2\u20ac\u0153John altered every shot, altered anything within two or three feet of the basket,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Zeller said of Henson against the Wolfpack. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153We just stayed in front of them and let John go block it. He did a superb job also of getting the rebounds.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<br \/>\nThe player who is starting to emerge in dramatic fashion, however, is Harrison Barnes. The freshman is getting comfortable and providing glimpses of the talent Coach Roy Williams saw when he made 11 trips to Ames, Iowa, to recruit Barnes.<br \/>\nBarnes hit the game-winning three-point shot against Miami and then had the biggest day of his young career so far by scoring 25 points on 10-of-16 shooting and 3-of-7 on three-point attempts against N.C. State. He also had six rebounds, an assist and a steal<br \/>\nHenson seemed to enjoy what Barnes did as much as what he, himself, accomplished.<br \/>\n\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I love it,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Henson said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153He told me he was going to be more aggressive. He went out there and did his thing. It was something that we have been waiting for and it finally happened today. I just hope it continues for the rest of the ACC [schedule]. With him shooting like that and playing like that, we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re a much better team.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<br \/>\nBarnes has handled a difficult situation as well as any coach could hope. No Carolina player ever came to Chapel Hill preceded by more expectations. He was named an All-American before he attended a UNC practice, much less played in a game. Then when he struggled to perform with consistency the first three months of the season, television commentators, other members of the media and fans around the country speculated on whether he is as talented as projected.<br \/>\nThe good news for Carolina fans is that Barnes and Henson are not the only talented players on this team, and that is why, barring catastrophic injury, Carolina is going to continue to improve until it runs out of games to play this season.<br \/>\n\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Early in the season, I thought the team was going to get better and better, and I still think that,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Williams said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>No team sits idle.<br \/>\nThey are either moving forward in their progress or slipping. The ideal scenario is to learn while winning, rather than struggling to find confidence and learn while losing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":15498,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[431],"class_list":["post-15666","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15666","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15666"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15666\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15719,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15666\/revisions\/15719"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15498"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15666"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15666"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15666"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}