Sunday, April 5, 2009

Tudor's Take: Title game thoughts

-- Could tonight's championship game between Michigan State and North Carolina be all but over at halftime?

A couple of trends say so. The Tar Heels (33-4) have a 31-2 record when they go to intermission with a lead. But not so fast. The Spartans are 23-1 when leading at the half.

In Saturday's semifinals, Carolina led Villanova 49-40 and Michigan State was up 38-36 on Connecticut at the breaks.

-- Something else to keep an eye on is Michigan State's scoring total. Tom Izzo's team is 19-1 when it scores more than 70 points in a game. Only Gonzaga among the Heels' last five opponents scored more than 70.

-- Possible good omen for the Heels: The last team to play in its home state in the championship game was Duke in 1994 at Charlotte. With Arkansas fan and President Bill Clinton in the house, the Blue Devils lost that night to the Razorbacks.

-- With 18 points in Saturday's win, Carolina senior Tyler Hansbrough jumped Larry Bird on the all-time NCAA scoring list. Hansbrough has 2,854 points _ 12th on the all-time list.

-- In championship games, the Heels are 4-4. The wins were over Kansas (1957), Georgetown (1982), Michigan (1993) and Illinois (2005). The losses: Oklahoma State (1946), UCLA (1968), Marquette (1977) and Indiana (1981).

-- Caulton Tudor

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

Could it be over by halftime? Yes it could. GO HEELS!

Anonymous said...

Oh... wouldn't that be nice!

Anonymous said...

Go Green. There ain't nothing like a Detroit Party.

MSU will win by 7.

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Anonymous said...

Go State

Anonymous said...

Do not believe the "talk" about how the December 3 game was an aberration. Our Heels know that they are at least 20 pts better than MSU. Certaibly they have to say the right things and be politically correct, but there is no mystery as to this outcome.

Heels will rock the house and win by 15 easy.

James said...

Let's hope they don't riot in the streets of Detroit when they don't get their way, like they do in LA.... Get ready MS fans, it's going to happen....UNC 2009 National Champions....

vic said...

I hope state comes to play tonight the last meeting was, well you saw the score. go Heels

Anonymous said...

Not a chance.

The game will be tight most of the way....Izzo's too good to allow that to happen with all his resources available. And I'm as big a Heels fan as anyone, but you guys expecting a similar result to the December game aren't going to have any fingernails left by the time this one's over.

Besides, when's the last time Carolina won a national title game easily, or got blown out? Every one of the Heels title wins has been a nail-biter - Illinois, Michigan, G'town, Kansas in '57.

The IU loss in the '81 final was probably as lopsided a final involving the Heels as I can remember and that was tight at half until IU smoked UNC in the 2nd.

GO HEELS!!

Anonymous said...

"Hansbrough has 2,854 points--12th on the all-time scoring list"

I forgot, who's #1 on that list??