College basketball 2011: North Carolina is in shipshape condition

If you want hoops hype in November, you can’t just throw two high-profile teams — in this case No. 1 North Carolina and Michigan State — in a gym.

You need to stage the game on a billion-dollar aircraft carrier: the U.S.S. Carl Vinson, the one that carried Osama Bin Laden’s body out to sea.

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The Michigan State University Spartans and North Carolina Tar Heels basketball teams will find themselves on a new court this Veteran's day-- on the U.S. Navy Warship, the U.S.S. Carl Vinson--the ship that took Osama bin Laden's body to sea for burial. (Nov. 11)

You need a top-ranked team that may have the best chance to go unbeaten since Indiana did it in 1976.

You need President Obama.

And of course you need Dick Vitale.

The only problem with Friday night’s much-ballyhooed “Carrier Classic” is that unless someone from Michigan State can figure out a way to heave all the basketballs overboard, the Spartans may have trouble staying on the court — and the ship — with North Carolina.

Yes, the Tar Heels are potentially that good.

Sometime this winter, North Carolina Coach Roy Williams needs to write a thank-you note to David Stern and Billy Hunter. The decision by the NBA commissioner and the head of the players’ union to go to war is one reason why it may be close to impossible to deny Ol’ Roy his third national title in eight seasons.

The Tar Heels had three underclassmen who were locks to be first-round picks last spring, led by then-freshman Harrison Barnes, who would have gone in the top three. Big men John Henson and Tyler Zeller, who both blossomed late last winter, might have been lottery picks, too.

But with everyone talking lockout, all three decided that one more year on a picturesque campus wasn’t such a bad thing. So they’re back in Chapel Hill, where they are joined by two freshmen who also might be first-round picks if and when the NBA holds another draft. One is 6-foot-9 James McAdoo, who some scouts rate ahead of Barnes as a pro prospect. The other is 6-5 shooting guard P.J. Hairston, who just happens to play the one position where North Carolina might need some help after a season-ending injury to sophomore Leslie McDonald.

Oh, there’s one more thing: the most valuable Tar Heels player may be the one least-valued by NBA scouts. That’s sophomore point guard Kendall Marshall, an O’Connell grad who became a full-time starter midway through last season when Larry Drew II, seeing his playing time diminish, stalked off in a huff and transferred. Williams owes Drew a thank-you note, too, because as soon as he was gone, Marshall became the full-time point guard and North Carolina, after a very shaky start, ended up winning the ACC regular season title and coming up about two plays short of the Final Four.

Are there teams out there that can beat the Tar Heels? Anything is possible. The list includes most of the usual suspects: Kentucky, Ohio State, Connecticut and Syracuse. If you noticed that Duke isn’t on the list, that’s because the Blue Devils have exactly zero starters left from their national championship team of two years ago and could be a little down this winter.

Kentucky Coach John Calipari has another loaded freshmen class and even returns a very talented sophomore in Terence Jones. It must be great as a recruiter to be able to go out every year and say, “No, we don’t have any starters graduating but just about all of them are leaving.”