UNC confirmed today that Marcus Ginyard had surgery to insert a screw into his left foot to repair a stress fracture.
From ACC Now:
North Carolina forward Marcus Ginyard will be sidelined for at least eight weeks after having surgery to repair a stress fracture in his left foot Wednesday, the school announced.
Doctors inserted a screw in his fifth left metatarsal, according to the news release.
Ginyard, the starting small forward, averaged 6.9 points and 4.5 rebounds last season and has been named the team’s Defensive Player of the Year each othe past two seasons. He also contributes a key leadership role, and played most of last season despite hobbling around in a walking boot on his left foot because of a nagging injury to his left toe. The injuries are related, a team spokesman confirmed.
Eight weeks from now means December so you can go ahead and pencil him in at close to ready by January and hopefully full speed by the ACC home stretch. A foot injury like this is tough because you are limited in what you can do to keep you conditioning up.
As for team impact. Obviously time for Danny Green to step up and play big. Not that he has not in the past but now he gets to be a starter. Green will need to be huge, especially on defense, since that was Ginyard’s forte. I also think Bobby Frasor will be called upon more at the two slot for his defense with Ginyard out. This obviously changes slightly what I wrote earlier about Frasor and with the backcourt depth getting a tad thin I imagine we will see more of Larry Drew earlier than expected. I also wonder if Roy will go big more often using Ed Davis or Tyler Zeller in with Tyler Hansbrough and Deon Thompson. So many possibilities, so little time. Anyway, UNC will have to adjust for the first few weeks and play some big games without a senior leader and the team’s best defender. That pretty much adds more pressure to Ty Lawson and Wayne Ellington among others to really get on board in terms of playing great defense. I am sort of expecting UNC to be a better team defensively this season mainly because they cannot win a title without it but also because I think the proper focus will be there from guys who have previously opted to only play good defense in spurts. With Ginyard out for a bit, that is even more important to cover the void.
And general discussions of team chemistry when Ginyard comes back are not on the table right now.
