ESPN Men's Basketball

When the father of twins David Wear and Travis Wear asked North Carolina coach Roy Williams for their scholarship releases, Williams said it "came as a complete surprise."

When they ended up transferring to UCLA, the twins were quiet about their reasons for leaving the Tar Heels, with their father not wanting to talk about it either.

Apparently, the twins' roommate at North Carolina was left in the dark as well, as forward Tyler Zeller -- one of the Tar Heels' few returning post players -- still seems confused by it all in an interview with The News & Observer.

Zeller, who roomed with the twins, still appeared baffled by the way they made their exit: "I saw them the day before they left, and they didn't say anything [about not coming back]. Ed [Davis] called me the next morning and said, 'They left.' I said, 'What are you talking about, I saw them yesterday?' And he said, 'They left - it's all over the Internet.' I didn't know what to think."

As of this interview last month, he still hadn't heard from the Wears. He said he holds no animosity toward them, but he also prefers to look forward, not back.

The Wears' sudden departure certainly won't be remembered in the annals of weird college roommate stories, but it's interesting to note the extent to which the twins kept their intentions private.

And that, of course, led to unnecessary speculation. For example, in the hours after they announced they were leaving North Carolina, guard Larry Drew II jokingly went on Twitter with his own theory.

#theyleftbecause they found out they would have to room with zeller...again."

College basketball nation blogger Eamonn Brennan takes a look at the difference between a fan's perception of top picks and actual NBA draft projections.

Al-Farouq Aminu at No. 5? Ed Davis at No. 7? Daniel Orton at No. 13? Really?

There's something funky about the NBA draft for college hoops people: The ordered talent on draft boards only occasionally resembles what we saw throughout a given college hoops season. This isn't hard to explain. NBA scouts and general managers factor in more than just college production when they're looking at prospects; scouts also look at what the team needs, how a player meshes with his teammates, the player's raw athleticism, and whether Joe X will be considerably better in five years than he was during his college days. This concept is called "potential." You may be vaguely familiar with it.

Brennan breaks down his "based solely on production" mock NBA draft -- the first 14 picks, anyway.

Right about now Roy Williams has to feel like a frantic shopper on Christmas Eve.

With the recruiting window all but closed on the class of 2010, the North Carolina coach suddenly finds himself in need of some big men.

The surprising announcement that Travis and David Wear were leaving Chapel Hill leaves the Tar Heels with a gaping hole inside. With Ed Davis and Deon Thompson gone, North Carolina now has a roster that includes just two experienced big men, Tyler Zeller and John Henson and a whole lot of players under 6-4.

Williams landed the most coveted recruit in the class of 2010 in Harrison Barnes, but the 6-7 Barnes as well as Reggie Bullock and Kendall Marshall won’t solve the Heels’ inside woes.

(A suggestion: call Jay Wright. He knows how to win with a bunch of guards).

“We are extremely disappointed that David and Travis are leaving the program,’’ Williams said in a statement. “I love both kids and they would have been very important parts of our team next season. It is a significant blow to our team as we had four post players and now we are down to two. They are quality kids and will be quality players.’’

In any season this sort of late development would be difficult to digest.

On the heels of UNC’s disastrous run, it’s even more of a blow. After an NIT-padded 20-17 finish, and a more telling 5-11 mark in the ACC, North Carolina has little wiggle room. The Tar Heels need to get good again and get good again fast.

The Wear brothers could have helped that cause. Theirs was a case when the numbers didn’t tell the whole story. Travis, hobbled midseason with an ankle injury, averaged just 3.5 points and 2.2 rebounds and David averaged 2.9 points and 1.7 boards. But the two McDonald’s All-Americans clearly had talent. In their limited minutes both were aggressive and showed a good basketball IQ.

The brothers are headed back to California to figure out their next move.

“Our coaching staff will look at whatever options are available,’’ Williams said. “But it’s hard to replace two quality players at this time.’’

Indeed Williams will be searching for a pre-Christmas miracle, the hoops equivalent of finding the hot toy sitting undiscovered on a shelf.

Mark Titus is a tremendous jokester, easily the funniest college basketball player of the past few years. You don't build a following the size of Titus' with a blog about your end-of-the-bench exploits without a sense of humor, and Titus certainly has that. Which is a shame for Ohio State fans, actually. Because thanks to Titus' cruel April Fools' Day prank, plenty of them got completely punked.

Titus took to his Twitter feed yesterday to entice Buckeyes followers with an all-too-tantalizing notion: That runaway Associated Press player of the year Evan Turner was leaning toward staying at OSU for his senior year:

Impressed w/ OSU recruits in McD's game last night. With The Villain coming back, they should be preseason #1. I really might redshirt now.

Let me clarify. The Villain hasn't officially decided, but he's hinted to me by saying things like "We're gonna be loaded next year".

He's also hinted by saying "I'm going to stay for my senior year" and "I'm not going to NBA this year". Sorry I drew conclusions from this.

Oh, Titus. You trickster.

Of course, Turner isn't returning for his senior year. Or, if he does, it won't have anything to do with the fake comments Titus posted on his blog yesterday. Turner is the consensus No. 2 -- and possible No. 1 -- overall pick in the NBA draft next year. Returning for his senior season would not only put him at risk of injury, but would mean gambling his financial future on the NBA lockout in 2011. Evan Turner is not staying. Sorry, folks. April Fool's.

Oh, and in other April 1-related clarifications: Ed Davis is not transferring to a different school. Stupid April Fools. For one day of the year, it's almost like you can't trust everything you read on the Internet.

CHESTNUT HILL, Mass. -- North Carolina coach Roy Williams scanned his team's schedule Friday night and saw a potential path to the NCAA tournament.

Beat Boston College on Saturday, rip off four more wins in a row to get to 8-8 in the ACC and the Tar Heels would be right there for an NCAA at-large bid.

"I thought we'd get on a run and be in the NCAA tournament," said the Hall of Fame coach. "Now we have to readjust and get it done Wednesday [against Florida State]. I've never been in this position. I've never cared if we were a one seed, two seed or a three seed. But I thought that if we win five in a row, get to 8-8, that would get us in, but we didn’t get the first step."

Despite having multiple chances to beat Boston College, the Tar Heels once again couldn't finish a game, losing to the Eagles 71-67 at Conte Forum. The loss dropped UNC to 3-9 in the ACC, 14-13 overall, and left it dangerously close to playing itself out of the NIT (it's unlikely UNC would pay to play in the CBI) and, gasp, finishing last in the ACC.

The Tar Heels have the tiebreaker with last-place NC State (3-10 in ACC play) after sweeping the Wolfpack. But if the Tar Heels were to fall so far as to finish last they would, per league rules, not participate in next season's ACC-Big Ten Challenge, just like Georgia Tech this season. That would have been unheard of a few months ago.

After the game, it was BC sophomore Reggie Jackson (17 points), not anyone on the Tar Heels, talking about winning out and finishing 8-8 in the league and possibly winning the ACC tournament and bursting a team's bubble. The Eagles now stand at 4-8 in the ACC, 13-13 overall.

"Everybody knew that this could be the start of five wins in a row," said Tar Heels senior guard Marcus Ginyard. "We were excited. We felt like we had a great attitude, a great practice and it didn't equate to the type of play we needed to win. We've got to play with more pride. That's the bottom line."

Don't blame Williams for projecting a possible NCAA tournament bid. He hasn't missed the NCAA tournament since 1989 -- his first season at Kansas -- and that was because the Jayhawks were on probation after Larry Brown's 1988 national championship season.

This is new territory for this group of Tar Heels as well as Williams. And it's hard to fathom for all of those involved.

North Carolina beat Ohio State -- with Evan Turner -- in New York in November and took out a healthy Michigan State team in the Big Ten-ACC Challenge in Chapel Hill, N.C., in December. The Tar Heels also beat the ACC's second-place team, Virginia Tech, at home, even after losing at College of Charleston in a game in which they were missing Ginyard and Will Graves to injury. Tyler Zeller missed 10 games with a stress fracture in his foot. He returned Saturday to score nine points and grab seven boards in 16 minutes, but he missed seven shots. Travis Wear missed his fourth game with a sprained left ankle and David Wear nearly missed this game with a hip injury. And, of course, double-double threat Ed Davis missed his third straight game with a fractured left wrist.

But these aren’t excuses. The Tar Heels still have talent (just watch John Henson as he scooped up a loose ball and snapped in a jumper while getting fouled or as he picked up a steal and flushed a jam). UNC has seven McDonald's All-Americans on its roster.

The Tar Heels were just 1-of-8 on 3-pointers, missed 32 2-point shots and were outrebounded by four by the smaller Eagles. Their guard play has been inconsistent, to say the least. Larry Drew II, Dexter Strickland and Leslie McDonald were unable to find a smooth stroke. Graves was 1-of-5 on 3s.

"It's been the most frustrating time I've had in coaching," Williams said.

Williams said the Charleston and Clemson losses shook UNC's confidence. He said prior to that he thought "we were really going to be good."

Williams said there was one point during the BC game when Drew looked at him after a turnover and said "my fault."

That didn’t wash well with Williams. Overall, he said the Tar Heels need to "freakin' play," since their backs were against the wall.

"You’ve got to go out and fight until you frickin' die," said a heated Williams, who has been coaching with a sling for a few weeks after undergoing shoulder surgery this season and is now dealing with a bad head cold.

The mood in the Tar Heels' locker room was somber. Remaining games against Florida State, at Wake Forest, home against Miami and at Duke all seem difficult at this stage.

Said UNC senior forward Deon Thompson, "I guess I know how other teams feel now."

That emotion may not subside until the season ends.

• As you can imagine, the Purdue fans at Hammer And Rails are ecstatic over their win in Columbus last night: "Winning in Bloomington... Check! Winning in East Lansing... Check! Winning in Columbus... Check! Who knew that we would win at those places, but we would lose in Evanston this year? This was a statement win in a season full of statement wins. This team continues to go in and get wins in places that have been very hard for us to play in lately, all while playing together as a team that is greater than the sum of its parts. Now add to that the fact we won all three of those in a four game stretch. I think that means we have earned Saturday's home game against Illinois." (Their Ohio State counterparts, meanwhile, have at least temporarily gone back to discussing football.)
• A Chicago-based sports management agency briefly listed Ed Davis as one of its clients early Thursday morning. The founder insists no one has made a deal with Davis, despite the Internet error, and that his contact has been limited to sporadic contact with the family and a few UNC games here and there. OK then?
• Keepin' The Bench Warm has some advice for Big Ten basketball coaches looking to recruit well: Win your own states. It's really that easy.
• Could Texas play themselves out of the bracket? It's unlikely, but not impossible.
• The NCAA tournament expands ... to 4,096 teams! This is totally going to water down the regular season.
• You do it to yourselves, it's true, and that's why it really hurts: Here's Gasaway on Villanova's prodigious fouling woes.
• I'll have more on this in Saddle Up, to be sure, but tonight is a big night for the Big East. Prepare thyself.
• Mike DeCourcy frets over the exclusion of Malcolm Delaney and Matt Bouldin from the voting for the Oscar Roberston Award, but I'm with RTC -- it's hard to see who you would move off the list in order to make room for either.
• Here's an early model for an NCAA tournament bracket simulation; get your sheets ready.
• Oklahoma is a mess. Count the ways.

As always, follow me on Twitter to send me links and tips.

• In advance of tonight's Purdue-Ohio State brawl, Ballin' Is A Habit offers a quick reminder that Ohio State, if it wins tonight and at Michigan State on Sunday, will be a game up on the rest of the Big Ten's contenders with a tiebreak advantage over MSU and PU. So, yeah, tonight's game is important. You could say that.
• Sad stuff from Texas A&M guard Derrick Roland, whose horrific injury early in the season has kept him out of the Aggies' run at the NCAA tournament -- and out of A&M's near miss against Kansas Monday night. As told to Yahoo's Jason King: "I started to cry once I got home," Roland said Tuesday night. "Every other game I’ve been fine. But that one shook me up. We could’ve won that game and I could’ve made a difference. I wanted so bad to be a part of it. Once I got home, it all hit me."
• Another very sad one: Former Florida All-American Dwayne Schintzius -- who, in addition to his basketball ability, you might remember as having one of the greatest basketball mullets of all-time -- is being treated for leukemia in Tampa in what has become a "months-long battle." Best of luck, Dwayne.
• Andy Glockner on Cornell center Jeff Foote. Seven-footers are rare enough in college basketball; they're even rarer in the Ivy League. (Quick: When's the last time an Ivy League team played a seven-foot guy?)
• The State columnist Ron Morris says NCAA tournament expansion won't happen because the NCAA presidents won't allow it: "This is not the time for college basketball to propose more missed class time, not when its athletes annually record among the lowest GPAs - and poorest graduation rates - of any sport. One of the reasons college presidents reject any thought of a college football playoff system is the probability of increased time away from campus for athletes. There is no way presidents will buy the same exchange for college basketball." Sorry, but the reason presidents make that argument about the BCS is because the BCS is a cash cow. College presidents want their athletes to do well academically, but most of them are realistic, and if getting millions of dollars from athletics means Ph.D. students in the biology department get a new lab -- at the cost of one more missed week of school for a group of 12 undergrads -- I'm betting Big State U president Adam McAcademic is going to go ahead and make that trade. What do you think?
• Rush The Court hits us with a list of ten underappreciated players, led by Texas A&M's Donald Sloan.
• Dear North Carolina fans (and everyone else, for that matter): Ed Davis would like you to stop bothering him. He's not going to tell you whether or not he's leaving school. Deal with it, dudes.
• An argument for how college basketball helped improve the NBA All-Star game. I did not see that one coming. (But I like it!)
• Maize and Brew has a little tongue-in-cheek fun with the rumors of Texas-to-the-Big-Ten rumors. It's totally good for everyone. Totally.
• Finally, a little ESPN love: Don't miss Andy Katz's conversation with former NCAA tournament selection committee members; nor should you overlook Pat Forde's latest Minutes, which is entertaining as always; and be sure to check out Dana O'Neil's all-access with referee Tim Higgins. Surprising: Higgins wears an awesome hat. Not surprising: Besides the whole being on the court thing, officiating doesn't look like very much fun.

CLEMSON, S.C. -- Roy Williams said he was sorry for being a little late coming down to the postgame news conference.

He had to deal with travel issues as North Carolina couldn’t fly back to Chapel Hill because there wasn’t a de-icing machine handy at the airport in nearby Anderson, S.C. The Tar Heels had to instead bus back so the players could be in class Thursday morning.

But being tardy for the media, something the punctual Williams is almost never accused of, was hardly the only thing he had to apologize for Wednesday night.

The Tar Heels were embarrassed by Clemson 83-64, UNC's worst regular-season loss ever under Williams.

“I just coached a poor game,’’ Williams said. “They had a tremendous sense of urgency and tremendous passion. We went down 7-0 and I almost called a timeout and I have never done that in my life.’’

Williams went on to detail how the Tar Heels had seasoned players who couldn’t pass or catch. He talked about how the Heels played with little poise. He was dead on.

Clemson dominated Carolina so much that you would hardly believe that it was UNC, not Clemson, that was picked to challenge Duke for the ACC regular-season title.

In the first half, UNC’s bigs of Ed Davis and Deon Thompson had one field goal. They finished with a combined four.

Williams was so frustrated at one point in the second half that he benched the five starters and put in his five freshmen. Williams spent the entire time the freshmen were on the court (about 91 seconds of game time) coaching and teaching his veteran players their press offense, never once looking at the court where the freshmen were competing. Assistant coach Steve Robinson handled that duty.

“I was drawing up our press offense because we had guys going the wrong way,’’ Williams said. “I have run the same press offense for 22 years and I love for teams to press because we run right through it, but we had guys going the wrong way.’’

The Tar Heels committed an alarming number of turnovers (26) on the night and allowed Clemson to shoot 57.6 percent in the first half.

This is the second time the Tar Heels have been in the state of South Carolina in the past two weeks and they've lost both games, the first at the College of Charleston (sans injured Marcus Ginyard and Will Graves) and then at Clemson (without injured Tyler Zeller, who had his right sore foot in a walking boot for precautionary reasons).

“Clemson showed what aggressive means,’’ said Williams, who was quite despondent in the postgame media room, about as down as I’ve seen him in recent years. “They had a great sense of urgency and poise and we need to play with that type of aggression and poise. I know that I keep saying the same thing, but I just don’t have a lot to say.’’

UNC has been a drastically different team at home versus on the road this season. The Tar Heels are 11-0 at home, scoring 88.5 points, given up 67.6 and shooting 52.6 percent at the Smith Center. Away from Chapel Hill, they’re an eye-popping 1-5, scoring 74.5 points, giving up 82.7 and shooting just 42.6 percent.

The numbers don’t lie. UNC has become average away from home, a shocking statement in itself. The Tar Heels, now 1-1 in the league, looked rather pedestrian after running past Virginia Tech in the second half Sunday night at home. The ACC is available for the taking, but only to those who can win on the road.

Heck, projected last-place Virginia is the only team undefeated at 2-0.

“The league is very good right now,’’ Williams said. “You have to protect your turf at home and get wins on the road. We have to play with more poise and I have to coach better.’’

North Carolina’s question from the preseason on was going to be its ability to score and defend on the perimeter.

On the eve of the ACC, the Tar Heels haven’t been able to solve that issue confidently. Not having starters Marcus Ginyard and Will Graves against the College of Charleston on Monday night meant the Tar Heels were down their top perimeter defender and their top 3-point shooter.

What that did was give Charleston the green light to launch 3-pointers. And the Cougars didn’t hesitate, making 13-of-32 in a thrilling 82-79 victory over the Tar Heels to create a worthy court-storming at Carolina First Arena.

Meanwhile, the Tar Heels made just 1-of-6 as guards Dexter Strickland (2-of-11) and Larry Drew II (3-of-10) struggled mightily from the field. Without Ginyard and Graves the Tar Heels just don’t have the personnel to defend someone like Andrew Goudelock, who has speed and the ability to launch shots over taller defenders. He did that in making 10 of 20 overall and 4 of 8 3s, including the game-tying, overtime-inducing 3-pointer with 2 seconds left on the Cougars’ final possession.

As ESPN researcher Jason McCallum pointed out, the Charleston starting backcourt outscored its UNC counterpart 52-17. Carolina's starting guards scored or assisted on just 11 of the 27 shots the Heels made. Yikes.

North Carolina can’t win the ACC unless Ginyard and Graves are healthy, and even with them, the guard play hasn’t been as consistent as say rival Jon Scheyer and Nolan Smith at Duke. Charleston should be in the mix for the Southern Conference title as projected in the preseason. The Tar Heels were considered an ACC title contender and a possible Final Four-bound team. If the guard play doesn’t improve, then the potential of big men Deon Thompson, Ed Davis, Tyler Zeller, John Henson and David Wear won’t be enough for UNC.