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(04/13/06 4:00am)
MOVIEREVIEW
"Stay Alive"
1.5 stars
So what do you do if you are the evil undead spirit of a woman who tortured young girls until being forcibly locked in a tower for all eternity?
In the old days, you might haunt the living through traditional means, but this is 2006 - the Playstation era.
With this in mind, writer/director William Brent Bell doesn't have his oh-so-cleverly-named "Blood Countess" simply rattle chains and float through walls.
(03/31/06 5:00am)
At ACC preseason media day in 2003, North Carolina coach Sylvia Hatchell could hardly contain herself when talking about her prized incoming freshman.
"This league has never had a player like Ivory Latta," she told the assembled media.
For a conference that has boasted stars such as Virginia's Dawn Staley and Duke's Alana Beard, the statement bordered on blasphemous.
The reporters rolled their eyes at her, Hatchell recalls.
Now, they just keep calling.
USA Today, the Boston Globe, The New York Times and the Chicago Tribune are among the newspapers that have joined in following the Tar Heels through their postseason run. Not to mention that every game has been on ESPN.
And just about all of the media are buzzing about Latta, the lightning-quick point guard with the megawatt smile.
Her attitude is as much of an attraction as her team-high 18.6 points per game. Latta's constant grin and buoyant manner have earned her legions of fans - as well as detractors - in addition to mountains of clippings.
"She's a great player, obviously," says senior Jessica Sell. "And that would get plenty of attention, but I just think her personality complements her play. And that really helps as far as the media coverage.
"They love her."
The first team All-America point guard was the subject of a pre-tournament Sports Illustrated feature in which the magazine picked the Tar Heels to win the national championship. She also has appeared in countless TV highlight reels.
Reporters ask questions such as "Has Ivory ever had a bad day?" They question her generous listed height of 5-foot-6. They even ask for her mother's cell phone number, which she provides happily.
And that's part of the allure - she is unfailingly polite. In the era of the spoiled athlete, Latta responds to questions from reporters with "Yes, sir" and "No, ma'am."
Try getting Barry Bonds to do that.
"She is so respectful," Hatchell says. "You don't see that a lot nowadays."
In Cleveland, media had circled Latta's designated chair before she even entered the interview room Monday. Once she sits down, the junior often has to answer the same question multiple times.
"I get 'em all," Latta says. "I get back-to-back questions all the time. I'm used to it. . It comes with a lot of fame."
And the fame has brought its share of infamy as well. At N.C. State, Latta was booed every time she touched the ball and serenaded with chants of "Latta Nothing."
With all of the attention she gets - positive and negative - there's no doubt the media onslaught will continue in Boston.
Camille Little is used to it.
Since she roomed with Latta during her freshman season, Little had to field all the queries about what it was like to live with the plucky point guard. After three years as Latta's teammate, she's got the same answer memorized for every question.
"Everybody's always writing a story about Ivory," Little says.
"They're always asking dumb questions."
Senior La'Tangela Atkinson says she doesn't mind the constant Latta babble.
"She has a great personality," Atkinson says. "I could talk for days about Ivory."
So could her fans.
From 10-year-old girls wearing Tar Heel T-shirts to the male teenager volunteers at the NCAA Regionals, Latta has autograph seekers at every turn.
And after three seasons at UNC, she is making Hatchell's freshman-year premonition come true.
"I just thought that people were going to fall in love with women's basketball because they wanted to watch Ivory," Hatchell says. "And I think that's happened."
Contact the Sports Editor at sports@unc.edu.
(03/30/06 5:00am)
CLEVELAND - Boston has about 350,000 more people and dozens more skyscrapers, but this weekend Beantown is going to look an awful lot like Greensboro.
Three of the four teams in the women's basketball Final Four hail from the ACC - an unprecedented feat for one conference - making it seem like the ACC Tournament Part Deux.
"We just played them for the ACC Championship" UNC coach Sylvia Hatchell said of her matchup with Maryland on Sunday at 7 p.m. at TD Banknorth Garden.
"We're going to have our scouting reports already done."
The Terrapins are the only team that has beaten the Tar Heels this season, winning an 98-95 overtime thriller in Carmichael Auditorium.
North Carolina got the better of Brenda Frese's squad in the rematch, handling the Terps, 91-80, in the ACC final in Greensboro.
In the other national semifinal, Duke plays Louisiana State at 9 p.m. on Sunday, setting up a possible Tobacco Road finale Tuesday night.
The only NCAA championship in ACC history is the Tar Heels' title in 1994.
UNC won that game when Charlotte Smith - now an assistant coach for the Tar Heels - hit a 3-pointer as time expired.
The league now has a 75 percent chance to bag another one in 2006.
Practice makes perfect
North Carolina's bruising, physical practices have been widely celebrated as the cause for Tar Heels' aggressiveness and ability to play through contact in games.
"They don't call nothing in practice," said junior Camille Little after UNC's Elite Eight victory Tuesday.
Tennessee, on the other hand, was not accustomed to North Carolina's brand of basketball.
"This is the most physical basketball game we have been in all year long," said Lady Vol coach Pat Summitt.
With the season on the line, both teams fought from the opening tip. A total of 30 personal fouls were called, and pileups and scrums accompanied almost every loose ball.
The stat that was most telling of the scrappy play on both sides was the game's 10 tie-ups.
Toppling a legend
After stepping down from the postgame interview podium Tuesday, Summitt, who has more wins than any male or female Division I basketball coach in history was met by a couple of star-struck fans - Little and Ivory Latta.
Latta, giddy to talk with the coach whose season she had just ended, said it was an honor to meet the Lady Vols' leader. Little playfully asked Summitt to sign the back of her jersey.
The just-vanquished coach just laughed and shook Latta's hand, saying "I wish you all the best."
Phi Slamma Jamma
Lady Vol Candace Parker, who is well known for her pair of dunks in Tennessee's NCAA opening round win against Army, wowed the crowd in warm-ups Tuesday by throwing down one-handed jams with ease.
UNC freshman Christina Dewitt tried some high-flying action of her own during the Tar Heel layup line, but her attempt failed, drawing ridicule from the Tennessee band.
After the 75-63 North Carolina win, though, Dewitt had the last laugh.
Contact the Sports Editor at sports@unc.edu.
(03/29/06 5:00am)
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CLEVELAND - What was once a 16-point North Carolina lead had been slashed to six when Ivory Latta stood dribbling at the top of the key, the shot clock winding down.
(03/28/06 5:00am)
CLEVELAND - Nine hundred and thirteen victories. Sixteen Final Four appearances. Six NCAA Championships.
It's a r
(03/27/06 5:00am)
If Ivory Latta's runner in the waning seconds of Sunday's heart-pounder didn't fall, LaToya Pringle knows who would have been in position for the putback.
"I think Erlana (Larkins) was right there somewhere in the area, she had to be," she said.
"The way she was getting rebounds in those last couple of minutes, I'm pretty sure she would have got it."
Latta's heroic shot earned SportsCenter highlight status, but it was Larkins, who finished with 23 points and seven rebounds, who kept North Carolina above water down the stretch to earn the hard-fought victory against Purdue at Quicken Loans Arena and to advance to the Elite Eight.
Larkins was a brutally efficient 10-for-13 from the floor and did everything but collect rent in the offensive paint during the final minutes.
When asked about Larkins' play down the stretch, senior La'Tangela Atkinson responded, "Which one?"
Larkins earned three of her five offensive boards during the last 6:20 and scored six crucial points - including back-to-back baskets that erased UNC's final deficit of the game with fewer than three minutes to play.
She hit a short turnaround in the lane to give UNC a 63-62 advantage, and then she used a textbook boxout to corral a missed 3-pointer by teammate Alex Miller and convert a layup.
"That's where she hurt us, was on the glass," said Purdue coach Kristy Curry.
Larkins also chipped in on defense, swatting an attempt by Boilermaker forward Lindsay Wisdom-Hylton to cause a shot-clock violation with 4:15 to play.
And she kept the Tar Heels in the game with 14 first-half points after the Boilermakers, who led by as many as nine, threatened to turn Sunday afternoon into North Carolina's last dance.
But like her team, Larkins was far from perfect.
With seven miscues, she had as many turnovers as rebounds. During UNC's sloppy start, she had three turnovers in the first five minutes.
"In the first half some of those were unforced," Larkins said. "I just wasn't - I don't know what I was looking at."
In the second stanza, the Boilermakers frequently double-teamed and frustrated Larkins.
"Purdue did a good job of, I guess, catching me off guard," she said.
"When I catch the ball in the post I like to take a minute and look around and see what's going on. And I know that Erin Lawless came over there a couple of times and maybe (Aya) Traore came over there a couple of times to trap the ball. And I didn't even know they were there."
But in crunch time, she re-emerged as the Tar Heels' biggest threat. And, Atkinson said, when Larkins is dominating in the post and gobbling up rebounds, there's no beating North Carolina.
"Erlana, she's just the rock of the team," Atkinson said. "She's very aggressive. She brings pretty much everything to the table. With her playing the way she's playing, we have a good chance to win a National Championship."
Contact the Sports Editor at sports@unc.edu.
(03/21/06 5:00am)
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NASHVILLE, Tenn. - Ivory Latta looked like she was about to get into a fight.
Yes, the same Ivory Latta whose smile lights up any TV screen and who usually has the word "bubbly" attached to her name was bleeding from her nose after a hard foul by Vanderbilt's Caroline Williams, and the two exchanged words.
(03/20/06 5:00am)
NASHVILLE, Tenn - Tonight, when No. 1 seed North Carolina takes on eighth-seeded Vanderbilt at 7 p.m. in Memorial Gymnasium, the Tar Heels will be wearing white home jerseys.
But the Tar Heels will be playing on the campus of the Commodores against a primarily black-and-gold clad crowd.
Most NCAA Tournament women's games are played on neutral courts, but for the second year in a row - and the third time in its last four trips to the Big Dance - UNC is in what might as well be considered a road game.
Last season UNC played Arizona State in Tempe, Ariz., in the third round, prevailing in the hostile environment and topping the Sun Devils 79-72.
"We were so focused on our game plan, what Coach Hatchell wanted us to do," senior La'Tangela Atkinson said.
"We don't have time to worry about what their fans are saying."
In that game, the Tar Heels were the No. 1 seed in the region as well, playing against No. 5 seed ASU. This time, they are a top seed again but facing a situation Hatchell said is unfair.
"I've been coaching a long time, and this is one area that should have been changed a long time ago," she said with a hint of frustration in her voice.
"If the coaches were in charge, it would never have been this way - never."
But if any team can handle the pressure of playing on the road, it should be the Tar Heels.
For the first time in school history, UNC finished the regular season a perfect 15-0 away from home - including wins in high-volume settings at Connecticut and Duke.
Vanderbilt, though, has the unusual advantage of knowing its quirky court. The Memorial Gymnasium is odd to visitors, as the benches are underneath the basket on either end of the floor rather than on the side, and the scorer's table and press row are below court level.
Atkinson and senior guard Jessica Sell said the strange surroundings threw them off a little bit but didn't present major worries during Saturday's win against UC Riverside.
"I was concerned with being able to hear the coaches," Sell said. "But everything worked out fine."
Even if the Tar Heels - who beat Vanderbilt by 20 in December - are able to silence the crowd and avoid falling into press row, they still have a minefield of a bracket ahead if they hope to reach the Final Four.
Four of the top 11 teams in the Associated Press poll reside in the Cleveland Regional- including juggernaut No. 2 seed Tennessee.
And though Hatchell might have a bone to pick with the selection committee, Sell said the team isn't distracted by the tough draw.
"We're just focused on our game plan and ready to play and win," she said.
"We aren't really thinking about where we're playing, who we're playing - any of that stuff."
Contact the Sports Editor at sports@unc.edu.
(02/28/06 5:00am)
The Duke women's basketball team has compiled an incredible run of success during the past two seasons, posting a 56-7 record and consistently hovering near the top of the polls.
But during that span, the Blue Devils are 0-5 against North Carolina.
Time and again, the Tar Heels have out-Duked the Devils, leaving the proud program searching for answers again after Saturday's 77-65 defeat in Carmichael Auditorium.
"We didn't play with a lot of poise," said Duke head coach Gail Goestenkors, who had a 12-game winning streak against North Carolina heading into last season.
"We didn't play our game. We didn't play Duke basketball."
That much was clear from the opening tip. Duke turned the ball over on three of its first four possessions, and after one minute and 39 seconds North Carolina had built a 6-0 lead, forcing Goestenkors to call a timeout.
For the game, the Blue Devils scored a season-low 65 points on a woeful 34.3 percent from the floor.
Some of Duke's offensive troubles could be attributed to UNC's devastating traps, which forced 23 turnovers and kept the Blue Devils out of sync. But Duke had plenty of open looks at the basket, as well.
Monique Currie, an All-American in 2005, was most emblematic of Duke's struggles. Despite putting up a career-high 43 points at Miami less than a week earlier, Currie mustered only 13 Saturday on 5-of-18 shooting, all but sinking her ACC Player of the Year candidacy.
"I guess it is something about Carolina," she said.
"They caused us to go out there and not play our game. They made us rush. They made us make bad decisions."
The Tar Heels start ACC Tournament play Friday against the winner of Thursday's game between Virginia and Boston College - UNC beat both teams earlier this season.
And if recent history is any indication - the last four ACC finals have been U.S. 15-501 showdowns - Duke will get another shot to end the streak this year.
"We're looking forward to playing them in the ACC Championship, and we know that they are going to give it their all," UNC forward Erlana Larkins said.
"So we can't be too confident."
And despite the streak, North Carolina coach Sylvia Hatchell still has plenty of respect for the Blue Devils.
"I think this is their best team ever," Hatchell said. "As far as talent and shooting and ball handling, their size - I don't think they have any weaknesses, really."
That is, except for some powder-blue kryptonite.
Contact the Sports Editor at sports@unc.edu.
(02/21/06 5:00am)
Everybody knows that Ivory Latta, North Carolina's sparkplug of a point guard, can dribble, drive, steal, shoot and generally harass any opponent she faces.
But surely she must be out of her element when matched up with a player almost twice her size.
That was the case Monday night during UNC's 69-62 victory against No. 18 Boston College, when Latta got a bad switch on a screen and found herself battling for position in the paint, trying to defend 6-foot-4 space-eater Lisa Macchia.
Macchia called for the ball, no doubt assuming that the 5-foot-6 (and that's generous) Latta wouldn't be much of an impediment between her and the hoop.
But soon after Macchia caught the ball, Latta swiped it for one of her career-high nine steals and cruised down the court for two of her game-high 23 points.
"I was going to try to get my second block of the season," Latta joked. "But I knew that wasn't going to happen."
What did happen capped a 10-2 run that gave the No. 3 Tar Heels a 12-point lead, and the Eagles never got closer than six throughout the rest of the game.
It was the first time B.C. had faced North Carolina, and Latta gave the Eagles quite the introduction to Chapel Hill.
"You can't stop everything Ivory does," said B.C. coach Cathy Inglese. "She's going to create some damage, you just want to try to limit it as much as you can."
Latta's damage - she was 9-of-14 from the floor and 3-of-6 from behind the arc - salvaged an uneven game for UNC.
The Tar Heels allowed B.C. to shoot 50 percent from the floor - only the second time all season a foe has accomplished that feat - and were outrebounded for the fourth game in a row.
"We didn't rebound again like I wanted us to," said UNC coach Sylvia Hatchell. "And that's the only area of our game I feel like we have to really step up there if we want to be a championship team."
North Carolina (25-1, 12-1 in the ACC) dug itself a 22-15 hole 10 minutes into the game. But UNC pressure forced turnovers on the Eagles' next six possessions and the Tar Heels roared ahead with a 12-0 run.
But the Eagles (19-8, 6-6) refused to go away. Despite their 25 turnovers, they were able to get open looks by finding the seams in the Tar Heel trap. Junior Kindyll Dorsey almost single-handedly kept B.C. in the game with 22 points, including 4-of-9 shooting from 3-point land.
Latta had answer after answer, though. When the Eagles cut the lead to six, Latta got it back to double digits with consecutive ankle-breaking moves. And at the end of the game, she dribbled out the clock and ceremoniously spiked the ball at midcourt.
Latta cast a more somber note in the post game press conference, as she and forward Camille Little (16 points) looked more fearful of Hatchell's next practice than Saturday's sold-out tilt with No. 1 Duke.
"They're sounding like there's going to be coffins lined up at practice on Wednesday," Hatchell quipped.
But both Latta and Little nodded emphatically, looking quite serious as the media chuckled.
Said Latta: "They ain't never seen us practice."
Contact the Sports Editor at sports@unc.edu.
(02/15/06 5:00am)
I would rather watch college basketball, the NBA or Wayne Gretzky's wife at the blackjack table.
I would even rather listen to Seahawks fans whine about officiating or baseball nuts salivate about spring training than hear one more breathless report about Michelle Kwan's groin.
I officially do not care one Bob Costas-sized bit about the Winter Olympics.
Think about it, the biggest news of the Games has been Kwan, who's not competing and probably wouldn't have won anything if she did.
I am sick of hearing all the stupid stories about athletes overcoming all odds to get to the top. I am sick of hearing names that no one will ever hear again until maybe four years from now.
In the end, it all adds up to more useless hype than campus elections.
There have been only two times in recorded history when the Winter Olympics have been worth caring about:
1. The adorable Jamaican bobsled team, made more loveable by the antics of John Candy (may God rest his jolly soul).
2. Everyone's favorite scandal: Gillooly-gate. For those too young to remember the innocent days of 1994, Jeff Gillooly was the ex-husband of figure skater Tonya Harding. Poor Tonya would do anything to win the gold. And anything included having Gillooly hire someone to club the bejeezus out of Nancy Kerrigan, her prime competition.
And in all the beautiful enduring images of figure skating - from Kristi Yamaguchi to Dave Coulier - Kerrigan writhing on the ground screaming "Whyyyy? Whyyyyyy?" remains the one people recognize the most.
Harding was allowed to compete while the investigation was going on, but she still finished eighth while Kerrigan recovered to get the silver medal.
The moral of the story remains that cheaters never prosper - that is, unless you count making an appearance on Fox's "Celebrity Boxing" and later getting arrested for drunk driving.
The real prosperity went to CBS, who scored enormous ratings from the controversy.
Fast forward 12 years, and there's not enough intrigue to get people to care about the Olympics in all of its tape-delayed glory.
This year, media outlets are too busy debating whether to call it the Turin or Torino Olympics to notice that the USA's supposed stars are flopping worse than "Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo."
First Kwan was out, then she was in and now she's out. Apolo Ohno didn't look Greek godlike when he slipped and lost in the 1500-meter speed skating semifinals. And Tuesday, hunky Bode Miller was disqualified in the Alpine combined.
Olympic lovers and NBC broadcasters alike will say that professional sports are tainted, while the Games represent some higher ideal of amateurism.
Excuse me while I gag.
It's hard to see the amateur behind the 57 official Olympic sponsors and 29 official suppliers. Not to mention all of the professional hockey players competing for just about every country.
The commercialism is most egregious in one simple fact: For the rights to the Turin/Torino Games and the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, NBC paid 1.5 billion junior bacon cheeseburgers.
Just like these annoying Olympics, that's a lot of empty calories.
Contact Daniel Malloy at dpmalloy@email.unc.edu.
(02/13/06 5:00am)
CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. - After flashy point guard Ivory Latta and bruising post player Erlana Larkins, there isn't much room in the hype surrounding the No. 1 North Carolina women's basketball team to talk about junior Camille Little.
Maybe it's because she's a little shyer than the rest, but Little flies under the radar for the Tar Heels, despite making contributions in just about every category of the box score.
So it makes sense that even though Little scored 16 points, pulled down eight rebounds and swiped four steals Sunday, in UNC's 72-60 win against Virginia at University Hall, she wasn't brought out for the postgame press conference. The media requested Latta and Larkins instead.
It was a little funny, considering that Little made the two biggest tide-turning plays of the night to keep North Carolina (23-1, 10-1 in the ACC) from losing their second game in a row - UNC lost to Maryland in overtime Thursday.
The first one came less than four minutes into the second half. Virginia (13-10, 2-9) had just cut North Carolina's 15-point halftime lead to five. A livid Sylvia Hatchell called her second timeout in three minutes.
On the ensuing possession, Little got the ball at the top of the key, pump faked and drove to the hole for the basket and the foul. The big bucket keyed a 15-5 UNC run.
But the feisty Cavaliers wouldn't go away, and they knocked the Tar Heels lead down to seven with less than four minutes to play.
No matter. Little caught a pass from sophomore Alex Miller at the top of the key and buried a dagger of a 3 to put UNC back up by 10.
The Cavaliers - who have now lost to North Carolina eight straight times - never got closer than eight points the rest of the way.
Little's timely shooting was needed Sunday to help salvage a lackluster game that had the victors acting like they had lost. Latta, who finished with a team-high 18 points, and Larkins stared off into space during the press conference and gave sullen responses.
"That's just something we have to work on in practice," Latta sighed when asked about the team's turnovers in the half court offense.
Little, who had to be cornered in the hallway for comment, put it bluntly.
"It just feels like we lost right now, even though we didn't," she said. "Because we are just not accepting how we won tonight."
The Tar Heels lost the rebounding battle - Hatchell's biggest pet peeve - 48 to 35. They shot only 4-for-17 from 3-point range. And they allowed a much less talented team to hang around and keep the outcome in doubt until the final minutes.
"We expect more of ourselves," Little said. "We got outrebounded again, and that's not how we play basketball."
But despite the stumbles, the Tar Heels pressed and trapped as usual - forcing 25 turnovers and prompting Virginia coach Debbie Ryan to say, "Nobody else in the country can put pressure on like they can."
The Tar Heels also were 26-of-35 from the charity stripe, making 11 more free throws than Virginia even attempted.
But it was clear that North Carolina's bright spots were more than outweighed by its notable troubles.
Said Hatchell: "We've got some things to straighten out when we get back to Chapel Hill."
Contact the Sports Editor at sports@unc.edu.
(01/31/06 5:00am)
It started with some innocent joking around after practice.
In those informal sessions 6-foot-1 forward Erlana Larkins would launch 3-pointers alongside long-range ace Ivory Latta. And she was pretty good at it.
Larkins wasn't really taking it seriously, but Latta - who knows a thing or two about 3s considering she has made one in 48 straight games - saw something more.
So while Larkins was stretching before Sunday night's epic Duke-North Carolina matchup, Latta bounded up to her with a message.
"E, go ahead," Latta said. "If they give you that shot, take it."
Now, a battle of the last two unbeaten teams in the country with ESPN2 cameras bearing down isn't exactly a time for joking around. But thoughts that Larkins, who was 1-for-7 from behind the arc for her career heading into Sunday's game, would be an outside threat were pretty laughable to the Blue Devils.
"We knew they would give us the 3-point shot in our motion offense because they didn't respect our post players (from outside)," Larkins said after the game.
The result of that disrespect: two tide-turning treys in the beginning of the second half that jump-started a dominant 20 minutes from Larkins and a miraculous UNC comeback.
Less than a minute into the half, Larkins nailed a step-back 3 at the top of the key.
"Just something told me to take it because we were down by (12)," Larkins said Monday. "I was like, 'Well, it won't hurt. I'm wide open, and I'll probably get yelled at if I don't take it.'"
A minute later, she hit another to cut the Duke advantage to 44-36, and it was the Duke defenders yelling at each other for leaving Larkins open. What was once a 16-point deficit had been sliced in half, and Duke's confidence had been cut down with it.
And after her brief outside shooting spree opened up the middle, Larkins went back to her bread and butter in the paint.
Twice she beat the entire Duke defense down the court for transition layups.
With 7:21 to play she cut the Blue Devil lead to four when she laid in a lob from Latta - further exciting the surprisingly loud Tar Heel fans in Cameron Indoor Stadium.
But two minutes later, disaster nearly struck as Larkins picked up her fourth foul, forcing her to the bench. She sat for a minute while sophomore LaToya Pringle - who is a shoo-in for most improved Tar Heel this season - chipped in two free throws and a layup to tie the game at 62.
Then Larkins came back to carry the rally to its conclusion.
She hit two free throws to give UNC its first lead since 14-13. And with less than 30 seconds to play - on the most crucial possession of the game - she picked up a loose ball and fired a pass to La'Tangela Atkinson who hit a layup to put the Tar Heels up by three.
Larkins' game, as usual, was an exercise in filling the box score - a season-high 23 points, four rebounds, four steals and two blocks.
But it was just one line on the stat sheet - 2-for-3 from 3-point range - that drew the most attention. And even if future opposing teams take the jumper away, Larkins' ball handling is no laughing matter either.
"I think more people are going to start honoring her jump shot outside, and then that's when she has the ability to drive past people," Latta said Monday.
"She's pretty deadly."
Senior writer Jacob Karabell contributed to this report.
Contact the Sports Editor at sports@unc.edu.
(01/27/06 5:00am)
WINSTON-SALEM - Wake Forest's pregame introductions Friday night included NBA-style lighting and music, and proclaimed "This is Our House . We Will Prevail."
The fact that it was Wake's house was called into question since about half the crowd of 5,342 was sporting powder blue, many there to cheer on Winston-Salem native Camille Little.
The Demon Deacons also did not prevail, as North Carolina romped to a 91-57 win, but it was seldom-used Christina Dewitt - not Little - who put on the best show for the Lawrence Joel Coliseum crowd.
The freshman finished with a game-high 22 points off the bench and provided something not expected from the 6-foot-2 forward - outside shooting.
Dewitt, who earned preseason fanfare for her rumored ability to dunk, was 4-of-4 from behind the arc on her way to more than doubling her previous career-high point total.
"I told her to shoot the ball," said UNC coach Sylvia Hatchell. "They aren't going to come out on you so shoot it. . She's one of our best-kept secrets right now."
North Carolina's dominance, however, is no secret.
The No. 3 Tar Heels, now 19-0, are off to the best start in school history and are set for an epic clash with archrival Duke on Sunday, the only other undefeated team left in the country.
The game starts at 7 p.m. in Cameron Indoor Stadium and can be seen on ESPN2.
Little, who finished with 17 points on 8-of-11 shooting, insisted that her team wasn't looking ahead.
"Sunday was not even a factor," she said.
And any fears that the Duke game was a factor were dispatched early in this one. Fifteen minutes into the game UNC had built a 39-19 lead and Wake already had used four of its five allotted timeouts.
Deacon coach Mike Peterson's stoppages did little to help his team.
Though UNC (6-0 in the ACC) was far from perfect - the Tar Heels turned the ball over 22 times and Ivory Latta shot only 2-of-12 - Wake (10-8, 2-4 in the ACC) was much worse.
The overwhelmed Deacons were no match for the Tar Heel trap, turning the ball over 29 times and never getting into an offensive rhythm.
"They were the aggressors all night long," Peterson said. "They dictated possessions. We didn't."
The early advantage got the Tar Heel bench involved early and often, keeping the stars fresh for Sunday's tilt. No UNC player was in the game for more than 25 minutes.
Heather Claytor chipped in with nine and the bench as a whole scored 47 points - more than half of the team's total.
Routs are becoming customary for the Tar Heels - only two of their 19 wins have come by less than 12 points - though Sunday's contest figures to be a much tighter one.
"I love playing in Cameron, it's a tremendous atmosphere," Hatchell said. "I've been coaching 31 years, and that's the type of game you dream about."
Contact the Sports Editor at sports@unc.edu.
(01/23/06 5:00am)
In crunch time Sunday against Florida State with a perfect season on the line, it was a 5-foot-6 point guard getting the job done for North Carolina.
But her name wasn't Ivory Latta.
Alex Miller's seven-point, four-rebound contribution off the bench was easy to overlook on the stat sheet, but she made the plays down the stretch to keep the No. 4 Tar Heels' perfect season rolling. UNC notched a 68-51 victory against Florida State in front of a near-capacity crowd of 7,056 in Carmichael Auditorium.
After a cold-shooting second half for both teams, the Tar Heels (18-0, 5-0 in the ACC) had a six-point lead with less than four minutes to play - plenty of time remaining for an FSU strike.
But after an uncharacteristic Latta airball, Miller suffocated guard LaQuinta Neely on the next possession, forcing a travel.
Two plays later, she sliced through the lane to put her team up 10.
Then Miller picked Neely's pocket and cruised coast-to-coast to give UNC a 61-49 lead, all but ensuring victory and tying the best start in school history.
Miller isn't flashy like Latta, who finished with 18 points and more than a few razzle-dazzle moves, and her reserved press-conference demeanor is a change of pace from the bubbly star.
"I just came in and played defense," Miller said, matter-of-factly. "That's what I'm best at. Just put pressure on the ball, got out in the passing lanes. . And got their point guard a little disturbed."
Miller's crunch-time defense was necessary in the sloppy win because early on, UNC almost got run out of its own gym.
In fact, for the first eight minutes it looked like UNC was facing the Florida State Tar Heels. The Seminoles (11-7, 2-3) forced steals in the backcourt and ran the fast break to perfection. Instead of the usual Latta and Camille Little breakaway layups, it was Neely and Alicia Gladden, who finished with a team-high 19 points, scoring uncontested hoops.
The 'Noles hit 10 of their first 12 shots, took a 21-15 lead and were playing the Tar Heels' high-octane game better than the hosts.
But after a media timeout with 12:01 to play in the half, UNC returned with more defensive fire and held FSU to just two points during the next eight minutes.
A key contributor to that 10-2 Tar Heel spurt was reserve center LaToya Pringle - who in only her sophomore season has already swatted her way to seventh on the all-time North Carolina blocked shot list.
She didn't score a point in the first half, but had three tide-turning blocks and sprawled on the floor to force a jump ball that went UNC's way. Pringle finished with four blocks and a career-high 11 rebounds.
"The way she's playing, she will be playing more," said UNC Coach Sylvia Hatchell. "We need her in a lot of these big games."
The Tar Heels' increased intensity on defense and FSU's cold shooting - including a frigid 10-of-32 in the second half - doomed the Seminoles. UNC finished the game on a 14-2 run.
But there were many troubling signs for Hatchell's squad despite the all-important "W."
For the third straight game UNC was outrebounded, and the Tar Heels had 19 turnovers compared with only nine assists. Latta, the team leader with 5.8 assists per game, had zero.
But the myriad mistakes will yield a few lessons for the Tar Heels as they prepare for battles this coming weekend at Wake Forest and undefeated, No. 2 Duke.
"A game like this is probably good for us," Hatchell said. "We'll learn a lot from it."
Contact the Sports Editor at sports@unc.edu.
(01/18/06 5:00am)
By the late 1970s, North Carolina basketball had gotten too big to fit into cozy Carmichael Auditorium.
Several 20-win seasons, Final Four appearances and an electrifying point guard named Phil Ford had transformed UNC into the toughest ticket in town. Students camped out for days for prime seating, and alumni found it almost impossible to gain access to the hallowed gym.
One proposal was to knock out the wall that separated Carmichael from Woollen Gym, which would expand seating from just more than 10,000 to 14,000.
Even that move was deemed too small.
Eventually, administrators reached the conclusion that a massive South Campus edifice was needed. But the building's future namesake wasn't convinced.
"I wasn't for this, I always thought we should have a hard ticket - we always sold out Carmichael," said former coach Dean Smith.
"The only thing that changed my mind is when they told me we could have more than twice as many students."
In fact, it was more than twice as many of everyone. The arena, which has added about 300 seats since opening, now seats 21,750 - making it the fifth largest college basketball facility in the country. For ACC games, the student allotment is about 6,000 - almost a quarter of the student body.
And despite Smith's worries, the Tar Heels are still a tough ticket. According to the Rams Club Web site, a $5,000 gift is required annu
ally for the opportunity to purchase two season basketball tickets. And that's only if they are available.
More people, less noise
So with twice as many fans filling the Smith Center on a regular basis, why was Carmichael a louder place to play?
"It doesn't make sense," Smith said. "You have more people yelling, which we have. It should be loud enough."
But the low ceiling and proximity of fans made Carmichael a fearsome place for opposing squads.
"There was definitely a transition going from Carmichael which was basically a big gym with metal seats, and the sounds in there just reverberate," said John Swofford, who was Director of Athletics when the Smith Center was built.
"All that added up to quite a loud environment for basketball games and a great home court advantage."
Also, in arenas like Carmichael and Duke's Cameron Indoor Stadium - lauded as one of the toughest places to play in the country - boisterous students are closer to the action, which is not the case in the Smith Center.
Even at newer and larger stadiums like Maryland's 17,950-seat Comcast Center and N.C. State's 19,722-seat RBC Center, students pack much of the prime seating.
The main difference between the Smith Center and those new rival gyms is funding.
Both arenas sold their naming rights to raise money and the Wolfpack basketball team must share its arena with the NHL's Carolina Hurricanes.
On the other hand, every penny of the $33.8 million needed to build the Smith Center came from private donations. And those 2,362 donors got most of the best seats in return for their contributions.
"We've got to balance the desire to (move students closer to the floor) with the promise that people made when they pledged," said Director of Athletics Dick Baddour, who was assistant director of athletics when the building opened.
"We told people you come into the Smith Center, and you get to pick out your seats, and you get to keep your seats as long as you are involved. And that's a pledge we want to keep."
Wine and cheese?
The Rams Club bigwigs who received those prime seats tend to be more subdued than the average 20-year-old, so the home court intimidation level has suffered.
One Daily Tar Heel column from 1986 referred to the building as "The Clean Dome" in contrast to the mayhem of Cameron Indoor.
In December 1991 Florida State defeated North Carolina in its first game in the ACC. Afterward, FSU guard Sam Cassell said of the opposing fans: "This is not a Duke kind of crowd. It's more like a cheese-and-wine crowd. Kind of laid-back."
That now-famous quote got under the skin of many a Tar Heel, and administrators worked to challenge that perception with a variety of initiatives.
The most important came in the 2000-01 season when 400 student seats were added beneath one basket - a section known as the risers. Students who receive these tickets must stand for the entire game, and some even camp out for big games.
The result, Baddour said, has been an improved crowd.
"We went through a little bit of time with the famous quote of wine-and-cheese crowd," Baddour said. "That's not the case anymore. . Our crowd in general, in my view, is more into the game than other places that I have seen."
But others say improvement still can be made.
Nolan Hayes, a 2001 UNC graduate who covered the team for The Daily Tar Heel and now writes about the Tar Heels for The (Durham) Herald Sun, said other ACC arenas are louder because of the student seating.
"There's probably not a whole lot of difference between the actual fans. The difference I see is who's closer to the court," said Hayes, who singled out Duke as the place with the biggest home court advantage in the conference.
"As far as the raucous atmosphere that everyone likes to talk about on TV, you have to have the kids near the court."
While sitting in the risers waiting for a recent game to start, freshman economics major Wes Johnson said more students need to be closer to the action.
"It would bring a lot more energy next to the court," he said.
"There is a lot of energy, but it's more spread-out."
Shuffling the students
But the students weren't always so spread-out.
Before the Smith Center was built there was contentious discussion among student leaders, Swofford and the Rams Club about where the students would sit.
"We had some interesting and long discussions, and what we were trying to do was reach a balance," said Swofford, who is now the commissioner of the ACC.
"Because the money was being raised from the private sector, you had to have some carrots."
The end result of the negotiations was a solid block of student seats in the lower level that included all of sections 109-117 - from directly behind one basket around to the UNC bench.
"We had more students courtside in the beginning than even (Duke) did," Smith said.
But the addition of the riser section for the 2000-01 season scattered the students around the lower level and resulted in fewer overall courtside seats.
Neither the Athletic Department nor the Carolina Athletic Association could provide a diagram of where students sit in the lower level because there is no longer a solid block. Associate Athletic Director for Ticket Operations Clint Gwaltney said it would take perhaps weeks to compile the diagram, since the seats are so scattered.
But Gwaltney said there were no significant changes in student seating since the risers were added.
A graphic from the Sept. 1, 2000 edition of the DTH shows the changes wrought by the risers.
The original lower-level student seating was largely intact before 2000. In fact, students picked up an additional 300 seats in 1989. But the riser negotiations, though they added students in a prime spot, displaced others to occupy the back rows of lower-level sections.
The result: a more spread-out student voice.
"(The students) felt like being sort of spread out through the arena would help with the intensity level," Baddour said.
"I actually questioned that myself. Did they really want to do that? Did they really want to split the student section?"
According to DTH archives, they did, or at least then-CAA President Tee Pruitt did.
"This will ignite the crowd environment," Pruitt was quoted as saying in the Sept. 1, 2000 DTH. "Having us behind the (opposing) bench will be very distracting."
Current freshman journalism major Michael Norman disagrees, saying that spreading the students out takes away from the energy.
"I am definitely all for having one section," Norman said.
"We should get priority lower level next to the band like football games, so we can get hype."
And 20 years, 275 games and countless players after the opening of the Smith Center, it's still student seating that gets all the hype.
Contact the Sports Editor at sports@unc.edu.
(01/10/06 5:00am)
March 5 - North Carolina wrestler Drew Forshey's hour came during the ACC Championship at Mat Jam in UNC-Greensboro's Fleming Gym.
(12/28/05 5:00am)
For UNC-Asheville, it really wasn't fair.
(12/17/05 5:00am)
Last year North Carolina started its season with an 11-point loss to Santa Clara.
(10/12/05 4:00am)
Forward Alex Stepheson gave a verbal commitment Tuesday to play basketball at North Carolina, a decision that solidifies Roy Williams' 2006 recruiting class as one of the best in the country.