The North Carolina Tar Heels won by not losing on Wednesday.
The victory over No. 12 seed Notre Dame may not have helped UNC’s NCAA chances. The Heels need a Quad I win in order to move their bubble status from barely out to barely in. However, the 76-56 blowout of the Irish left Carolina alive to fight another day. No. 5 UNC will face No. 4 Wake Forest in a battle of two bubble teams, with the winner likely getting the opportunity for a significant victory in Friday’s semifinals.
In addition to keeping UNC’s NCAA hopes afloat, the win showcased additional weapons for future opponents to game plan against.
Power forward Jae’Lyn Withers, who entered the game with 27 made threes on the season, hit 7-of-10 from outside, setting a school ACC Tournament record for outside shooting. Withers hit threes on three straight early possessions to put UNC on top 17-5, and the Heels never looked back. As a team, UNC hit 13-of-28 from three.
“I felt like not just J-Wit’s threes, everyone’s threes,” said coach Hubert Davis. “They were good threes generated by good offense, unselfishness, and as a result I thought we shot a really good percentage.”
UNC had 19 assists on 28 made shots. Point guard Elliot Cadeau led the way with 10, becoming the first Tar Heel with double-digit assists in the conference tourney since Marcus Paige in 2013.
“We did a good job of kind of penetrating and finding open guys and that’s how we were able to shoot a good percentage from three,” said RJ Davis, who finished with 13 points. “When you have that type of basketball, especially like in the first half, as an example, there was a close-out drive, hit J-Wit, J-Wit hits Seth (Trimble), Seth hits me, and I hit Ven (Allen Lubin), that type of ball movement is winning basketball. At the same time we’re having fun with it.”
UNC also turned it up on defense, led by freshman Drake Powell, who shut down ACC scoring leader Markus Burton. After averaging 21.7 points this season, Burton was held to 11 on 3-of-11 shooting.
“Drake is a gifted defensive player,” said coach Davis. “Obviously, he’s very athletic but he’s got tremendous length. He’s at 6’7″. I think one of the things that is most difficult against a scorer and especially Markus who leads the ACC in scoring is going up against length. So we just felt like starting the game off with Drake would make it even more difficult for him to be able to score. Markus is a great scorer because he can score from all three levels. He can get fouled, get to the free-throw line. He can go either direction. But I thought Drake’s length bothered him and made him work a little bit harder than usual.”
With Wake, and potentially Duke, looming, UNC has found another shooting threat and a defensive stopper. The last piece of the puzzle is to not get caught up in all the bubble talk.
“Just have the one-game-at-a-time approach,” said RJ Davis, “and that’s the mentality we have to have. You can’t look too far ahead into the quarterfinals or semifinals, you just have to take it one game at a time, and I think we’re doing a good job being present moment with that. Obviously you hear the noise, you hear being a bubble team. … It’s really just about staying present and understanding that anything is possible, so just be smart and enjoy it.”
