UNC basketball outlasts Boston College in rematch to remain perfect at home
North Carolina outlasted Boston College 58-47 in a closer-than-expected ACC basketball rematch Wednesday at the Dean E. Smith Center.
Carolina (14-5, 6-3 ACC) never trailed in the second half, though Boston College (8-11, 3-6) pulled within 50-47 with 7:13 left in the game. But the Tar Heels didn’t allow another basket and closed out the game on an 8-0 run as the Eagles missed their final 10 shots.
“Towards the end, when we needed to stop, we got the stops, and when we needed a basket, we made a basket,” said UNC coach Hubert Davis, who added, “A win is a win.”
Caleb Love led the way with 16 points for UNC, followed by R.J. Davis with 12 points. No other UNC player reached double figures. Armando Bacot grabbed a game-high 18 rebounds.
The Tar Heels defeated the Eagles 91-65 on Jan. 2 in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, playing without sophomore Dawson Garcia for most of the game. The 6-foot-11 forward suffered a concussion just two minutes into that first meeting. Garcia missed his second straight game Wednesday while back home in Minnesota due to a family illness.
Here’s what we learned from Carolina’s win:
Exhaustion for the Heels?
UNC’s starting five — Love, Davis, Leaky Black, Brady Manek and Bacot — again played major minutes without much relief from the bench. They all played at least 34 minutes in Monday’s win over Virginia Tech. They again played 34 or more minutes each against BC.
With games on Saturday against N.C. State and Tuesday at Louisville, fatigue could be a factor as the Heels finish out four games in nine days.
“At the end of the day, coach is comfortable with the guys that he has out there. That’s his call,” Black said. “I feel like we’re all battle-tested. I don’t think we were really tired today.”
It appeared to catch up to the Heels midway through the second half Wednesday against the Eagles. There was a lot of tugging on shorts, hands on hips and jogging up the floor from Carolina players even as they managed to take a 46-39 lead with 12:22 remaining.
The starters played that entire stretch to begin the second half before Hubert Davis substituted for the first time. Davis was animated during the timeout trying to implore his team to hustle.
“We can’t get beat back door. We can’t let them get second-chance points,” Black said. “They beat us to almost every loose ball tonight. And those are things we can control — you know, effort. And that’s all he was preaching to us.”
The concern over scoring
Carolina has now gone four straight games shooting below 40% from the field. In blowout losses at Miami and Wake Forest, it was expected that poor shooting led to their losses. But in home wins? It seems more of a trend than an aberration.
In the Jan. 2 win at Boston College, the Heels shot 52% from the field and made 11 of 23 3-pointers. On Wednesday, UNC managed to shoot 16 for 55 — or 29%. It was the lowest shooting percentage in a win since the Heels shot 30.8% in a win over William & Mary on Jan. 8, 1957.
“Shots weren’t falling and it was kind of weird, because that usually happens on the road and it’s not supposed to happen at home,” said Love, who was 5 for 17 shooting. “But it happened, so we just got to put this game behind us and we got to prepare for Saturday.”
Those struggles were highlighted by Bacot’s performance. His streak of 10 straight double-doubles ended after shooting 1 for 10 from the floor and finishing with six points. The Eagles tandem of James Karnik and 7-footer Quinten Post combined to body him on the blocks and make all of his shots contested.
After starting the Virginia Tech game perfect on his first six attempts, Bacot is now 2 for his last 23 shots from the field.
Defensive breakthrough?
Carolina held the Eagles to 16 second-half points. That was the fewest points allowed since Northern Iowa scored 16 in the second half on Dec. 21, 2016. And the 47 total points were the fewest the Heels have allowed in an ACC win since holding Virginia to 41 on Feb. 18, 2017.
Hubert Davis said after the game that some of it was Boston College missing open opportunities. But he pointed out areas on defense where Carolina helped forced the issue defensively. It started with the improvement of UNC’s on-ball pressure, Davis said
What might bode well for Saturday’s game against the Wolfpack is how the Heels handled screens. It’s been a weakness all season, and N.C. State will use a lot of ball screens.
“We weren’t affected by any screens,” Davis said. “We got over screens, we got through screens, we got under screens. We didn’t allow screens to be an excuse to not be able to guard our guy.”
Hunting for a shot
UNC guard Kerwin Walton hadn’t made more than two shots in a game since scoring a season-high 14 points against the College of Charleston on Nov. 16. He’d largely been invisible in the Heels’ lineup despite leading the team in 3-pointers last season.
He appeared more aggressive Wednesday against the Eagles. He was fouled on a 3-pointer and made all three free throws, then hit another 3 from the right corner in the first half. Davis pointed out that it was the first free throw attempts Walton took this season.
Even though Walton finished 1 for 4 from the field, Carolina needs him to continue to hunt for his shot, which he hasn’t always shown a tendency to do.
Those shots alone gave UNC more bench scoring than the two points it had in Monday’s win over Virginia Tech.
This story was originally published January 26, 2022 at 9:04 PM with the headline "UNC basketball outlasts Boston College in rematch to remain perfect at home."