I too had forgotten about that play, so I watched the video.
Looked really benign to me.
I read your guest column in which the author compares the Henderson/Hansbrough incident to a play in the 2004 game in Chapel Hill involving David Noel and Luol Deng. Although I was at that game, I had trouble remembering what had happened; I guess that's what 40+ years of watching these does to you. But, just a short time ago, I reviewed a You Tube clip of that play, via a thread on the Inside Carolina message board.
I almost laughed when I saw and remembered the play in question. I have always enjoyed this site, largely due of its relative objectivity, even with subjects involving UNC. However, by posting such nonsense as your guest columnist offers on this subject (e.g. "Noel slamming Deng to the floor", "Deng came close to suffering a catastrophic injury"), you lose a lot of credibility. To compare the two plays is laughable, at best.
To quote the revered Coach K, "I mean, come on." This column is beneath your fine site.
I too had forgotten about that play, so I watched the video.
Looked really benign to me.
agreed, there was no intent to injure. it was a play on the ball. probably should have been called a foul, but definitely nothing worse than that.
I'm assuming that DBR will now take down the Arnie Schechter piece or at least post the link to the video, demonstrating that the guest columnist's memory was clouded, to say the least.
Or perhaps you guys are trying to deflect?
There was certainly no malicious intent on Noel's part. Definitley just a part of the physical play of the game. Much like another play...
"flop"? "Bit of a reputation for that"?
Oh that's right - I remember the time we had a scholarship football player on our team who really wasn't a good foul shooter, so when he got bumped he was too "injured" to shoot the free throws. Oh wait - that was Ronald Curry, and that was unc.
If you come over here, bring some semblence of having a clue.
That's how I feel about it. Deng was injured semi-badly yet not permanently after Noel made an out of control, too strong play on the ball that should have been called a foul and nothing more.
Subsitute TH for Luol and GH for Noel and it's the exact same situation. The only distinction is the insane level of overreaction the latter incident received (from both TH and the media).
Looks like I touched a nerve.
But, I do believe that it is accurate to say that Duke has developed such a reputation over the past few years, among the non-Duke partisans at least. I think it's a fair statement, and was offered as a response to the question about the booing.
I assure you, I have a clue, much more so than the guy who tried to equate the Noel/Deng play to the one on Sunday.
If Hansbrough doesn't bleed and doesn't react like he wants to fight the entire Duke team, what happens? In my opinion, it's a flagrant foul and the game ends. I'm not blaming Hansbrough, but if he turns his head and Hendersons elbow lands on his shoulder, it's a hard foul, maybe flagrant and the game ends. My point...the blood, the reaction by Hansbrough and the crowd reaction lead to the officials acting the way they did.
A still photo after the fact tells nothing as I've been told before! He swings at the ball with an open hand (clearly seen on the video tape), body and head are not facing toward Hansbrough. He has turned toward where the ball got deflected. If he was trying to punch, elbow or hit him on purpose, that's an amazing thing to do without looking. Especially since he had no way of knowing that if Johnson doesn't foul Hansbrough first, the only thing that would have been there was the ball! We've all seen intentional hits on players and the defender never follows the ball, they go straight for the player. It was a hard foul, with awful results, but any person with basketball knowledge (including most of the Carolina team and Roy Williams) has stated that it wasn't intentional. The point is that the aftermath is what got everyone going. If his forearm had hit Hansbrough on top of the head (which could likely have happened given slight adjustments in the play), there's no blood, Hendorson has a sore arm and there's nothing called but maybe a flagrant foul.
"(including most of the Carolina team and Roy Williams) has stated that it wasn't intentional..."
Carolina's company line is pretty gracious, and it's undoubtedly not how some over there truly feel, but it serves the conference and rivalry far better than some of the things we've heard uttered so far.
As for Henderson, there's a whole lot of shuffling about the definition of intent going on. Not many rational people would say that he intended to drive his forearm into Hansbrough's nose. But not many rational people would say that he did not intend to create a violent collision, which ultimately resulted in lots of blood. Personally, I feel that there's no place in the sport for violence, and that what Henderson perpetrated was indeed violent. I have a hard time believing that anybody could reasonably refute that unless they felt they had something to protect.
This thread was started to discuss what, in my view, was a silly comparison between the play on Sunday and a play from a game 3 years ago. I tend to agree with this poster. I don't think Henderson intended to inflict injury, but I do believe he intended to "create a violent collision", and the unfortunate result was an injury. Whether or not that was his intent is certainly not known to anyone but him, and is debatable among others, obviously. I also believe that if this collision had resulted in a less severe injury, and less blood, it would have received little attention. However, in the play 3 years ago, no rational person would suggest that David Noel was trying to do anything other than make a defensive play. It was a 2-point game with 7 minutes to play. I don't even think it was especially violent; there are many more violent collisions than that one in the course of every Duke/UNC game.
Before I read the original column on this topic, I thought the headline was referring to the Larry Brown/Art Heyman incident from the early 60's. That would have made more sense.