If there was a public vote for coach of the year, and if I had a vote, and if the AFL could be trusted not to misplace the ballot, my vote would go towards North Melbourne's Brad Scott.

Friday night's slashing 29-point win over Carlton bumps the Kangaroos into the eight and squares their win-loss ledger at 6-6. If many believe that Hawthorn (5-6) will make the finals, then why not North Melbourne?

Back in March, many would have looked at the North list and thought that six wins would be a fair return for the season. 12 weeks in and on that score, mission accomplished.

At the start of the year Scott inherited a young list with a bit of raw talent and not much expectation. Melbourne's young guns have earned rave reviews, but how good are some of the Kangaroo youngsters?

On a night that the club celebrated 25 years of Friday night football, Scott was asked whether it was unfair that his club featured just once in the prime timeslot in 2010. The pragmatic coach answered that once the club had the runs on the board more Friday night matches would come.

Let's hope so because Ryan Bastinac, Jack Ziebell, Levi Greenwood, Todd Goldstein, Ben Warren and Lachie Hansen, to name a few, give you a reason to want to switch on and watch the footy.

Now, Lindsay Thomas isn't going to boot seven goals every time, but he was brilliant all night and try as he might, Blues coach Brett Ratten couldn't get the right match-up all evening.

North's win, and indeed its season, was all the more meritorious considering that arguably the team's most important player, key forward Drew Petrie, was missing with another foot injury. So far this year, he has played just one match. Imagine also, just how good North Melbourne would be if the enigmatic Daniel Wells displayed all he was capable of more than just a few times each season.

Once again, the footy gods struck down the Blues. Carlton was the talk of the town before playing Hawthorn a month ago, and was duly belted. On Friday morning, Carlton's no.1 media cheerleader, Robert Walls, boldly predicted that with five Etihad Stadium games on the trot, the Blues could soon be 12-4.

For now, they're 7-5 which, a bit like North, is better than many predicted at the start of the year.

But we pose the same question of the Blues that we did of the Bulldogs a couple of weeks back. Can they handle a bit of prosperity? Perhaps the Blues are better when they're hunting, instead of being hunted themselves.