NBA hoops are back — and the Charlotte Hornets got their first win of the season last night (Take that, Windy City), the Carolina Panthers are 7-0 (let’s gooooooo), Duke and UNC square off in Chapel Hill this weekend with massive Coastal Division title implications on the line, and Steph Curry is raining drops of manna from the basketball heavens. Basically, it’s a good time to love NC sports. With that in mind, here’s our collection of this week’s best from North Carolina sportswriting:
The timing of this first article couldn’t have been better — Jonathan Jones of the Charlotte Observer makes another appearance in our weekly best as he goes in-depth to feature the two men behind the mics for Carolina Panthers Spanish broadcasts: Jaime Moreno and Luis Moreno Jr. Speak of these two orators, I believe they had a busy night on Monday. (I love this so much.)
It’s been a long time since professional baseball was played inside the city of Raleigh – but, as Josh Shaffer of the News & Observer chronicles, Oak City hosted it’s own team for years and years — not too far from downtown, including one special season in 1959 when Carl Yastrzemski made his professional debut. For those who are stat nerds like me — Stat Boi stands tall — Yaz was awesome in ’59: 15 homers, 100 RBI, .472 OBP, and an OPS of 1.051.
In case your focus hasn’t shifted to the NBA yet, let me explain to you here: Steph Curry is doing insane things with the basketball right now — and it’s more than just shooting the rock, according to Spencer Lund of Uproxx. But like, his shooting is insane, too: so far this season, he’s scored a total of 148 points (through four games) while playing only 127 minutes on just 84 shots.
It was an eventful last 6-7 days for the Triangle ACC football squads, I think, right? Maybe? Regardless, over at WRALSportsFan, Lauren Brownlow has an excellent rundown of what occurred during the last week for NC State, Duke and UNC.
The Panthers OT win over the Colts two nights back had plenty of highlights — and probably some lowlights, too — but once again it was cornerback Josh Norman, who seemed to save Carolina’s cookies at multiple high-leverage moments during the game. Lake Norman told our buddy Bill Voth over at Black and Blue Review that playing on the soggy pitch of Bank of America Stadium reminded him of Gotham City.
