Quick Hitters - North Carolina at Pittsburgh
Isaac Schade presents Quick Hitters from North Carolina’s 75-65 road win over Pittsburgh on Tuesday night.
Quick Hitters from North Carolina’s 75-65 road win over Pittsburgh on Tuesday night.
Highlights:
Condensed Game:
- After starting out ACC play with seven straight games decided by seven or fewer points, it’s been nice to get a little bit of breathing room in the past two games; winning each by double-digits.
- The game was essentially over after Carolina went on an extended 15-4 run midway through the second half. To Pitt’s credit though, they fought back and got the lead down to five before Carolina made the necessary plays down the stretch to secure a road victory against a strong ACC opponent. That run included this Leaky Black steal and run-out:
- Last season, Carolina finished ACC play at 6-14 and picked up that sixth win on March 3. Tonight’s victory on January 26 was ACC victory number six, matching last season’s ACC win total with 11 conferences games to go.
- Statistically speaking, the stars of the night were Armando Bacot and Garrison Brooks. Bacot notched his fourth double-double of the season and first of the “20-and-10” variety, finishing with 21 points and 10 rebounds. Brooks added in 16 points and six rebounds in a nice bounce-back game after being saddled with foul trouble against NC State last time out. The combined 37 points is just shy of being exactly half of the Tar Heels’ 75 points tonight.
- Bacot is on fire. And it is an efficient fire. He has essentially put up the same shooting numbers each of the past three games: 8-for-10, 8-for-12, 8-for-10. That total comes out to 24-for-32 or 75.0 percent. For the season, Bacot’s field goal percentage is up to 65.5 percent, which would be third all-time at Carolina if the season ended today.
- Bacot is not the only Tar Heel shooting efficiently. Although Carolina’s streak of shooting 50 percent or better ended at three halves, they shot a strong 45.5 percent in the first half and a blistering 60.7 percent in the second. That means UNC has made 50 percent or more of their field goal attempts in four of the last five halves. Additionally, they’ve now shot over 50 percent in total for each of the past two games.
- Despite strong overall shooting, Carolina shot poorly from “three and free”. Carolina was 4-for-17 (23.5 percent) from the three point line and 7-for-14 (50.0 percent) from the free throw line. Combined with the poor performance from both areas against NC State on Saturday and Carolina has shot 15-for-32 (46.9 percent) from the free throw line and 8-for-28 (28.6 percent) from three the past two games.
- That isn’t to say there was no good news from three or the free throw line. Kerwin Walton’s second three-pointer came immediately after Pitt had closed the lead to five points. Walton’s shot got the ball rolling on a 7-0 Carolina run that took just 65 seconds. Caleb Love later hit his lone three-pointer with just 3:00 remaining in the game. It was a big-time shot in a big-time moment for the freshman. That shot once against stemmed the tide after Pitt had trimmed the lead back down to five. In good free throw news, Pitt fouled Armando Bacot with 0:37 remaining and he calmly knocked down both ends of a 1-and-1 to give Carolina the final 75-65 tally.
- Tonight’s rebounding performance was not an overly dominant one (+8) but did have several impactful moments. By the first media timeout, the Heels already had two offensive rebounds and four second-chance points. Twice in the second half, Carolina missed a free throw only to grab the offensive rebound and immediately score.
- Another rebounding curiosity: Andrew Platek grabbed three offensive rebounds over a span of just 69 seconds in the first half. Those were his only rebounds of the game.
- Carolina surrendered a season-low three steals.
- One of the most important stats of the night (and likely of long-term importance as well) was that Caleb Love had five assists and just one turnover. The assists were all in the first half. And to be fair to Love, the one turnover came on an unfortunate play where he was making a good offensive move and spun into a defender, which drew him an offensive foul with 1:40 left in the game. Love was that close to having his first zero turnover college game.
- Part of why Love’s numbers are improving is his rapidly evolving decision making capability. Early in the game, he missed a shot, corralled the tipped out offensive rebound, drove back into the lane, and utilized a floater over a defender looking to take a charge. On other sequences, he drove, but used the defensive rotations caused by his penetration to find teammates. On one occasion it was a kick-out to Kerwin Walton for his first three of the game. On another occasion, Love drew Brooks’ defender to himself and dumped off a pass to the big man for an easy two. This kid is maturing and seeing the court better. It’s fun to watch Love’s growth happen before our eyes. Buckle up and enjoy the ride.
- Listen folks, Justin Champagnie is the real deal. All signs point to him finishing as the ACC Player of the Year. He finished with 23 points on just nine shots, as well as hauling in 10 rebounds and blocking two shots. As odd as it might sound, Carolina was able to limit Champagnie to just nine shots (he is averaging 14 for the season).
- Where the Tar Heel defense really shined was in shutting down Champagnie’s running mates. Champagnie, along with Xavier Johnson and Au’Diese Toney are averaging 50.4 points per game this season, the most by any trio in the ACC. Champagnie held up his end of that average with 23 points, but Johnson and Toney combined to score just 15. UNC was able to hold the trio 12 points shy of their season average.
- Saturday against NC State was the first time in seven straight games that Carolina didn’t assist on at least 62 percent of their field goals. They got right back to it tonight though, assisting on 22 of their 32 made baskets, 68.6 percent. Postgame, Garrison Brooks said, “It’s us growing together. We had 22 assists on 32 baskets. That’s just good basketball.”
- Carolina is continuing to learn to value the basketball. While there were sloppy moments tonight, including five turnovers in the first ten minutes, the Heels only had two more the rest of the half and just one in the first 12 minutes of the second half. They ultimately finished with 13 turnovers, the fifth straight game with 14 or fewer.
- While you would ideally like to build a big lead and hold it, the Tar Heels should be commended for their ability to stifle every run Pittsburgh had in them. Coach Williams said postgame, “Every time they made a run, we answered it.”
- One key to the recent success is quite clearly the Tar Heels learning how to be ready to compete from the tip-off. Long gone are the double-digit first half deficits of earlier in the year. It’s particularly important to get a good start on the road, and the Heels did so tonight.
- 48 of UNC’s 75 points were in the paint. Roy Williams will be quite pleased with that number. Here are two of the 48:
- Pitt had a field goal drought in the first half going from 16:13 through 7:49. That’s just shy of eight-and-a-half minutes without a field goal.
- Walker Kessler only played 90 seconds but made the most of it on defense. On back-to-back defensive possessions, Kessler went out to defend on the perimeter and got a steal and then blocked a shot on the next Pitt possession.
- Kerwin Walton continues to show a willingness to pump fake and come inside the line for a two-point shot rather than forcing a three. Quite frankly, the more he does this, the more teams will have to respect his driving and/or pull-up capability, which should give him more space to operate on the perimeter.
- Starting with Walton’s three that spurred the 15-4 run, Carolina made nine of their next 10 field goal attempts.
- All-in-all, this was probably the biggest win of the season thus far. Each time out, Carolina looks better and better. No reason to expect they won’t continue to grow, as is perennially the case for a Roy-Williams-coached team.
Box Score
Roy Williams postgame press conference
Players postgame press conference
Armando Bacot
Garrison Brooks
Caleb Love
Remember to check in for Quick Hitters after every North Carolina basketball game. Next up is a road game against Clemson on Tuesday, February 2. Tip is at 7:00pm ET on ACC Network.
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