Friday, December 31, 2004

2004 Football in review

Well, I'm back from my trip to the Tire Bowl, which I'm probably more bummed out about than I ought to be. It always eats at me more when I don't think the other team is just plain better than we are. BC is a pretty good, nothing special team with a great quarterback, which, come to think of it, isn't a bad description of the Tar Heels. Put another way, I think that on a talent level the teams were about even, and we got beat. It happens. BC deserved to win, because they outexecuted us. I just don't take it well.

6-6 has an "eech" ring to it that 7-5 would avoid, but no fairminded person could have looked at the team we began the season with and seen a bowl game of any kind facing the schedule we did. I think the extension given to Bunting was the right thing and my faith in him as the right guy for the long haul was restored after having been badly shaken by the UVa and Louisville debacles.

We lost to Utah, FSU, BC, Louisville, UVa, and Virginia Tech. Of those games, I'd like to get VT and BC back; the other 4 I think were not realistically winnable games (though I am tempted to include Va on my list, if we could have played them in the second half of the season). And, of course, we beat Miami in what is without question the biggest win I've ever seen in Kenan.

Yesterday, we just didn't have the same sharpness we had in the previous 4 games. Aside from the first quarter, I thought we looked fine, but we weren't playing with the same level of defensive aggressiveness I'd gotten accustomed to. We also picked a terrible game for our offensive line to turn in perhaps its only subpar game of the season. But those last 4 games happened, and it would be foolish to let the loss in what is ultimately a meaningless bowl game tarnish that fact. Being a great team was not a realistic goal for 2004. I think we were about as good as could have possibly been expected.

One note from the game: if you could have seen the BC kicker trying to practice field goals, you wouldn't have been caught off guard by the fake field goal. He may be the worst kicker on any major college team -- perhaps he's hurt or something, but he couldn't hit a thing, even in practice with no rush. Shame we couldn't take advantage.

Sunday, December 26, 2004

Just for fun while we wait for January

Just a few things, having nothing whatsoever to do with the Heels, to bide time while we wait for the season to restart in earnest:

Someone tried to collect the "best of" the email attachments you may have gotten during 2004. I think I saw some that were funnier, but in this "top 10" there are definitely some keepers.

Also, someone tried to find out how Christmas came to be on December 25th. I love stuff like this. According to this article, there are two main theories: one is that the 25th is approximately when the days begin to lengthen, and thus a symbol of hope and abundant life; the other is based on scriptural interpretation and inference.

Friday, December 24, 2004

Merry Christmas

As I've been busy most of the holiday season (even now we're trying to get the kids to sleep, at least a LITTLE), I haven't been around to post, but I wanted to say that I am, in fact, still alive, aware that the Heels have played some games I haven't blogged, and fully intend to return in full force post-holiday.

I hope that anyone who happens to come across this finds themselves in the midst of a great Christmas season.

Monday, December 20, 2004

The early returns

Although I think DH is basically right about Wake Forest, I'm a little concerned about the way the rest of the ACC is shaping up. The conventional wisdom has been that the ACC is so good that they'll all beat up on each other and have records that look worse than they really are.

I'm not so sure about that.

Basically, the only two teams in the conference that I think look to be "up to snuff" so far are the Tar Heels and (I hate to say it) Blue Devils. For a bit there, I thought that perhaps NCSU was underrated, but after a close call against La. Lafayette and a loss to the first good team they've played (Washington), I'm not as sure.

Wake, of course, got murdered on national TV and haven't really looked like their preseason ranking in the games they've won. Georgia Tech barely escaped Illinois-Chicago, and then lost to Gonzaga, again, the first really good team they've played.

Maryland is expected to be pretty good, though not great. So far, "pretty good" may be a reach -- losses to George Washington and Wisconsin, and they barely dodged an FSU team that has 4 losses to some unimpressive teams (Florida International? Texas A&M CC?).

Clemson's record is good, but they haven't beaten anyone worth mentioning. Virginia is probably the only surprising team to the good side, but I don't think UVa is what anyone had in mind when they were talking up the ACC.

In short, the ACC might be the best conference in the country, but I don't think that after the top 2 or 3 teams that the rest of the league is really head and shoulders above what you can find elsewhere in the country.

Tuesday, December 14, 2004

And the surest way to know hope is lost . . .

. . . is when I lose focus on the game to the point that I can no longer ignore how bad a commentator Len Elmore is. He's like Clark Kellogg on lithium.

Go Flames!

The official sign that I think that UIC actually has a chance to pull the upset over Duke (they're down 1 point with 6 minutes left in the first half) is that I have checked their Sagarin rating to make sure my hope is not in vain. UIC rates 58th thus far this season. Duke is 5th (Carolina 6th).

They're 3-3, with losses to Georgia Tech (by 1!), Wisconsin-Milwaukee, and Bowling Green.

I'd say don't get your hopes up unless it's still close with 10 minutes to play. My read on UIC is that they're one of those teams that's good enough to beat you on a bad night but not good enough to win without getting some nice breaks. And given that Shavlik Randolph just assaulted some guy on their team, resulting not in a foul call, but a turnover to Duke leading to 3 points, don't count on it.

Monday, December 06, 2004

Ho-Ho-Ho . . .