Devastating

By Kartik Krishnaiyer
Canes Rising Staff

Sometimes in life sports can get the best of us. I'll admit I'm writing this on almost zero sleep and that I hope the team itself does not lay awake the way I did last night pondering future games and how we could waste two scintillating performances from Dwayne Collins in a three days period.

The fact is I am now in my mid thirties, have a wife and a career and travel often. When I was a kid I used to be overly emotional about sporting events. When I was in college at the University of Florida, I began to be able to keep these emotions in check. I am actually traveling abroad in the next few days partly to see family, partly for work related items. These days besides my political/issue consulting which I have worked in for years, I cover soccer professionally as a pseudo journalist/blogger/radio host. In covering that sport I'm very objective and very rarely get myself wrapped up in emotions. (While abroad I will be able to continue to see every UM Basketball game. I may be delinquent on football news as I will be relying on the Internet to find it, but Basketball coverage will remain consistent.)

But the bottom line is this: my emotion last night and this morning is because I have been around long enough to know that last night's OT loss to a vastly inferior NC State team is the kind of thing that send an otherwise deserving tournament team to the NIT. Coming from 19 down and then having the game within our grasp if we could only make a defensive stop made matters worse. Thinking about how we let a similar game get away in Raleigh last year against a similarly outclassed Wolfpack team made matters worse. And finally, the fact that a loss is a given if UM's games go to overtime. Why is that? Why does a team that looks so well coached for much of the game always go to pieces on final possessions or in overtime.

Eight straight overtime losses is not acceptable. Even the whipping bags nationally usually don't perform that badly in close games time after time. Maybe I'm being simplistic but both against Virginia Tech which I witnessed in person and last night which I watched on TV I really believe a big does of Dwayne Collins in overtime would have won BOTH games for the Canes.

Instead Miami tried to set screens to let Jack McClinton shoot or force Jack to handle the ball. I'm not downplaying how much this team has depended on Jack the past few years, but the fact is the last two games the Canes have have wasted career best performances from Brian Asbury and Adrian Thomas. The Hurricanes have wasted Dwayne Collins inside dominance and have completely gone to pieces when the game was on the line.

Over reliance on Jack McClinton is killing this team late. Other players are capable of stepping up as Asbury and Thomas have shown the last two games. Dwayne Collins is now Miami's most complete player. A month ago we wondered if DC would be able to take this team to the next level. The answer is, he's taken his game to the next level but the team is slipping rapidly.

Lance Hurdle strives for consistency but seems to be operating a million miles per hour and thus is mistake prone. James Dews right now is in a slump of epic proportions. Cyrus McGowan after a promising start seems to be doing more harm than good when he's in the game. Julian Gamble isn't getting the minutes to take the burden off Jimmy Graham whose intensity is beginning to wane because he's having to play too much. More important than anything is that Coach Frank Haith is so frustrated with the lack of defensive intensity he keeps shifting defensive sets in game to figure out what will work.

Problems that were buried a week ago after a win over a solid Florida State team are now out in the open. Miami, a very good defensive team last season is now a bad one. The Canes were second in FT % in the ACC last year but are tenth this season. Jack McClinton's points and assists are up but so are his turnovers. James Dews who averaged double digits last year is averaging under 5 ppg in ACC play. Lance Hurdle's FT% has dropped by over 20 percentage points.

All of a sudden the Canes do not look like the team that won an NCAA game a year ago and won several big games earlier this season. Instead Miami looks like a team that is more talented than its opponents but makes critical mistakes at critical times to lose games. That's how teams end up in the NIT.

Let's all hope that is not Miami's fate.