The Tarheels

they're doomed

In his 2010 draft guide, Kiper rates the top players available for next year's draft by position. Notably, he rates:

Marvin Austin - #1 DT (1 of 15 "5" rated players)
Robert Quinn - #1 DE (1 of 15 "5" rated players)
Bruce Carter - #1 OLB (1 of 15 "5" rated players)
Quan Sturdivant - #1 MLB (1 of 15 "5" rated players)
Deunta Williams - #2 S
Zack Pianalto - #8 TE
Charles Brown - #6 CB
Kendrick Bruney - #8 CB
Alan Pelc - #13 OG
Shaun Draughn - #24 RB

 

http://www.newsobserver.com/2010/04/30/460158/healthy-parker-eager.html

 

The award honors the most outstanding male and female high school athletes in the state. They were presented at the Dean E. Smith Center on the University of North Carolina campus during the NCHSAA's Annual Meeting on Thursday.

Selection is made by a special panel of media representatives from across the state.

Martin is a tremendous three-sport athlete, earning all-conference honors in football, basketball and track.

In football, he was a star who was the 2009 Northern Carolina Conference Defensive Player of the Year and the Lineman of the Year. During the 2009 campaign he had 121 tackles, including 21 for loss, forced eight fumbles, had five sacks and intercepted a pass, while on offense he caught 14 passes for 248 yards and four scores, leading Roanoke Rapids to its deepest run ever in the football playoffs. He was named to several all-star teams, starting for the North Carolina team in the Shrine Bowl as well as being selected for the All-American Bowl in Dallas, Texas.

He was also the Northern Carolina Conference Basketball Player of the Year, with averages of 15 points, 11 rebounds, nine blocked shots and three assists per game.

He is currently competing in track and field and earned the conference championship in both the high jump and the high hurdles, two events in which he has also set a Roanoke Rapids school record. A stellar student who has maintained a 4.0 grade point average and will graduate in the top five percent of his senior class, he will attend the University of North Carolina next year on a football scholarship.

 

ACC Coaching: For Better Or Worse

ACC Coaching: For Better Or Worse


Head coaching in college football has become a high profile, cut-throat, instant result demanding job. For the selective few who get the chance, most seemingly can't cut it for more than a few seasons.

We've seen that trend in the ACC with head coaches being fired almost yearly. Most recently UVA's Al Groh was booted after unmet standards on the field caught up to him. Additionally last season, the rock of ACC head coaches, Bobby Bowden, was effectively forced to retire thus promoting head coach-in-waiting, Jimbo Fisher to the lead role at FSU.

The coaching turnover is simply part of football now.

Names like Amato, Gailey, Bowden (Tommy), Jagodzinski, Roof, Bunting litter our record books with unfulfilled expectations and frustrating memories.

Currently, teams like Maryland (Ralph Friedgen) and NC State (Tom O'Brien) have head coaches who despite triumphal entries, have failed to live up to expectations and might be next in line to have their names listed above.

With that however, there appears to be some promise for the ACC. Virgina Tech's Frank Beamer is one of the most revered coaches in the nation. His teams have consistently been at the top of the conference and they show no signs of giving ground without a fight.

The very coach who might bring that fight, Paul Johnson of Georgia Tech. He appears to be the league's most feared and heralded recent addition. The installation of his Flex-bone triple-option based offense at a BSC conference level was thought to be a high risk move by many college football pundits. Two ACC Coach of the Year awards and a championship trophy in his first two seasons show the Jackets have a head coach that will stop at nothing to put his team near the top of the league each year.

Other solid coaches in the league include Wake's Jim Grobe and Duke's head man David Cutcliff. Coach Grobe has turned his small school's program into a perennial competitor, while Duke's Cutcliff looks to mirror that same path. Both have shown a propensity to improve their teams on a regular basis.

Outside of those few, the league's coaching question marks are numerous.

The name at the top of that list, Miami's Randy Shannon, a players coach who cannot seem to find consistency with the storied program's current cast of all-star players.

Boston College's Frank Spaziani has yet to do anything wrong in the head role, I guess that's a good thing to say about a head coach? For that matter, there is not much he's done to judge up to this point, so not screwing up totally must count for something.

UVA's new leader Mike London, sure has his work cut out for him. Cavalier fans should give him a year to regroup, but expectations for steady improvement will be thrust upon his young team soon. Year two will be more of an accurate barometer of who Coach London is.

Speaking of new coaches, what's that old saying? "You never want to be the guy who follows a legend"... Welcome to Tallahassee Captain Jimbo! FSU fans want to get back to the glory days and they expect it this year. If the Seminoles progress over the past two seasons is any indication of what they will actually be this season, they should be good, but no where near those expectations of past grander. You wanted to follow papa Bowden... well, you got it.

Butch Davis is another coach that has really done little to prove his worth at UNC. A stellar defense will be his best weapon this fall. Will it be enough?... It better be, because it will be gone next year and there is little on the horizon to keep the Tar Heel fans from questioning the growth of their football program.

Finally, Dabo Swinney of Clemson. Personally, he drives me nuts with his sideline convulsions and over the top Rah-Rah antics. But in year one of his full time tenure, his methods appeared to work. Granted it's hard not to score points giving the ball to C.J. Spiller 25 times a game, but to give credit where credit is due, Dabo recognized it and exploited it.

Can Coach Swinney repeat that success without the nation's most dynamic player? Will his chaotic behavior wear thin with the Tiger fan-base? Will his coaching style maintain a disciplined team? Those are the questions that might be answered this season.

All in all, the head coaching situation in the ACC isn't much to brag about. With only two top notch head coaches in the conference, the league's perception looks to stay well under the strong held positions of the SEC and Big XII.

The ACC needs to have a dynamic 2010 season to prove its national worth and give its fans something to be excited about. But, in general, the current cast of ACC head coaches make it seem improbable those national perceptions will change anytime soon.

 

yep

 

If the Heels had an offense at least 70% as good as the defense we would be talking top 10 at the end of the year. Unfortunately that isn't the case. Davis has done a decent job of rebuilding the program after the shape Bunting had left it but they've lost too many games they should have won and losing to State like they have is inexcusable. I'd like to see more progress out of the program since it seems UNC has decided to make football a higher priority these days.

 

losing to Virginia is worse

 

I don't know what it is but no matter the talent level on either side UVA has always had UNCs number.

Cool deal naming some Kenan. Kenan Dean?

 

Burned by the public promise he broke at Miami in 2000, Butch Davis no longer uses definitive statements in regard to his future.

When asked about his future at North Carolina, Davis went about as far as he's willing to go.

"I have every intention of making this my last job," Davis said in an extensive interview this spring.

Davis, 58, has three seasons in the books at UNC, with five seasons left on his contract. His fourth Tar Heels team promises to be his best, with 19 starters back from a team that won eight games.

Davis gives himself an out with references to "every intention," because shortly after telling his Miami team, in no uncertain terms, that he wasn't leaving, he left for the Cleveland Browns.

One door Davis will shut is on a return to the NFL. He's not going back, he said, not to the Dallas Cowboys, where he was an assistant for six seasons, or anywhere else.

There isn't an obvious job to lure Davis out of Chapel Hill, where his son is a junior in high school, and he's quite comfortable with his station in the UNC athletics department.

Davis already has declined an offer from Arkansas (his alma mater), and he chose UNC without waiting to determine whether a return to Miami would be possible in December 2006. In contrast, Mack Brown left UNC after building a top-10 program in 1997, in part, because of the popularity of the Tar Heels' basketball program and the perception - by both the fan base and media - of the football program's second-class status.

Davis said he isn't keeping tabs on who rules the school.

"I don't care," Davis said without a hint of bitterness.

He said he fully respects the basketball program and Roy Williams' two national titles since 2005. It's just that Davis maintains a singular focus, with no time left over for reindeer games about who's on top.

More than anything, Davis wants to win. As an assistant to Jimmy Johnson, he won a national title at Miami in 1987 and two Super Bowl rings with the Dallas Cowboys.

On his own, he's 71-38 in nine college seasons, 24-34 in four NFL seasons.

Sure, he set up Larry Coker at Miami for a no-brainer national title in 2001 - and every football insider understands that - but that title still officially goes on Coker's resume while Davis pursues his own.

Davis is not stoking any national title talk for this UNC team, at least not outside the locker room, but he's hoping for a leap from the past two 8-5 seasons which have been beset by injuries (in 2009) and a maddening tendency to play to the level of competition.

After slogging through NCAA scholarship restrictions, it took until Davis' sixth season to break through the double-digit win barrier at Miami.

But with the Tar Heels' experience and talent - especially on defense - there's a flash of excitement in Davis' eyes when he talks about this UNC team.

"One of the things that will be dramatically different with this team is we have 22 seniors, and of those arguably, 16 are significant contributors," Davis said. "Where in Year 1 when I got here, we had 10 seniors, and only three had played in a game."

This might be Davis' best chance at an ACC title, but given his stance on his future, it won't be his last.

www.newsobserver.com/2010/06/0...y-with-tar.html

 

insider.espn.go.com/ncf/recrui...mp;viewmore=yes

Commits:6
ESPNU 150 Commits:1
Top Prospect:ATH Everett Golson
Five-star commits:0
Four-star:3
Three-star:2
Others:1

The Tar Heels have six commits and three four-star players -- ATH Everett Golson (Myrtle Beach, S.C./Myrtle Beach), RB Travis Riley (Kannapolis, N.C./A.L. Brown) and TE Eric Ebron (Greensboro, N.C./Smith). Golson, No. 136 in the ESPNU 150, is an intriguing and difficult guy to evaluate because as a QB he displays some impressive traits as a passer, yet he is short (6-0, 172 pounds) and built like a wide receiver. However, we are not sure he possesses the speed to move to safety or wide receiver. Athletically Golson can do some very dangerous things with his arm and legs and moving to another position will always be an option. Where he fits best in North Carolina will be determined down the road. Riley is an under-the-radar back who has every-down qualities. He can pound it between the tackles, rip off an occasional long run, catch the ball out of the backfield and pick up bigger linebackers on the blitz. Ebron is a top-10 TE with good hands who could create some big plays, especially down in the red zone.