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Sunday, January 15, 2012

Florida State Demolished Number 3 North Carolina 90-57 on GameDay National TV - We Were There - More Coverage Coming

Harry Note - Yes - we were at the game and yes I stormed the court and got some great video. We got great seats outside for face value for the sold out game for $21. More video and story coming later.

This is from the Tallahassee Democrat -

Hardly anyone gave the Florida State men's basketball team a chance to win Saturday afternoon against No. 3 North Carolina. And absolutely, positively nobody gave them a chance to win like this. Behind a sparkling performance from senior Deividas Dulkys, FSU trounced the Tar Heels 90-57 in front of a loud, sold-out, energetic crowd at the Civic Center. "When I got on the bench I looked and was like, 'Luke, are we really up 30?'" Dulkys said. As hard it was for anyone to believe, fellow senior Luke Loucks assured him they were. And Dulkys, of course, was a major reason why. The Lithuania native scored 16 points in each half to finish with a new career high of 32 points (on 12-of-14 shooting overall and 8-of-10 from 3-point range) in leading the Seminoles to yet another court-storming victory. The 33-point margin was the worst defeat under coach Roy Williams ever. And it just so happened to come with ESPN's "College GameDay" in town and Dick Vitale broadcasting the game to a national television audience. "It says an awful lot for our program to get that kind of level of exposure and be successful in it," said FSU coach Leonard Hamilton, whose team improved to 11-6, 2-1 in the ACC. The game was such a rout that the FSU students began lining up in the aisles to rush the floor with five minutes remaining. UNC coach Roy Williams took his scholarship players and coaches off the court with 14 seconds left to avoid the onslaught of students. FSU junior guard Michael Snaer knew it was coming too, and he made sure to enjoy it. Briefly." I've seen it, done it before," said Snaer, who finished with 17 points. "So as soon as the last horn went off, I went off running to the locker room. I saw them all rush the court, so I enjoyed it for a second. But last year I got caught in the middle and just the smell - beer and things — and being smothered … so this year I was like, 'Let me head off to the locker room.' " That's a veteran play. That's a veteran move. Unlike last year's court-storming victory, an upset of then-No. 1 Duke, there wasn't an ounce of drama in the final minutes this time around. The Seminoles had an eight-point lead at halftime and with five minutes gone in the second half it had ballooned to 21 on a Dulkys 3-pointer. At the 11:28 mark the lead was 30, and the Tar Heels (15-3, 2-1) never cut it closer than 22 the rest of the way. "In the past we've let a lot of teams stick around to the end and that's when they make us pay," Loucks said. "It wasn't time to let up. It wasn't time to stall. We had to step on the gas. "They wound up stepping on the Tar Heels' necks instead, obliterating a team that was ranked preseason No. 1 in the country. It was a jaw-dropping performance from an FSU team that a week ago had lost by 20 at Clemson. Carolina's Williams seemed genuinely stunned — like everyone else for that matter — when the game was over. "We had no answers for them on the court, I had no answers for them on the sideline," Williams said. "I did the worst job of coaching the team that I've ever done, worst job of preparing a team to play that I've ever done. I've got to do a heck of a lot better job than that. Though Dulkys was deservedly the headliner in the upset win, the vaunted Florida State defense was once again a major factor. The Seminoles held the nation's leading scoring team to just 57 points — 30 below their season average. North Carolina's trio of future NBA first-round draft picks scored 39 points, but Harrison Barnes was just 5 of 13 from the floor and John Henson was 0 for 7 from the free-throw line and received a technical foul midway through the second half. Though Tyler Zeller finished with 14 points (on 6-of-8 shooting) and 14 rebounds, the Carolina guards — specifically point guard Kendall Marshall — had a hard time finding the All-America candidates in the post. Marshall, who is second in the nation in assists, was guarded by Snaer for much of the game and finished with just four assists to go along with seven turnovers. "The type of player he is, he's so good that he's too confident," Snaer said. "He just thinks he's going to be able to dribble out there, pick it up and flip a pass. When he picked the ball up I tried to smother him every single time and he wasn't able to make those pin-point passes you've been seeing. "The Seminoles never stopped playing with energy because they knew quite well that the Tar Heels were capable of a comeback. We know what they're capable of," Dulkys said. "They're a very, very good team. We just played well today."

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