Quick Hitters - North Carolina vs. Marquette

Isaac Schade presents Quick Hitters from North Carolina’s 83-70 home loss to Marquette on Wednesday evening.

Author:
Isaac Schade
Feb 25, 2021 12:50 AM EST

Quick Hitters from North Carolina’s 83-70 home loss to Marquette on Wednesday evening.

Highlights:

Condensed Game:

Losing always hurts, but sometimes it reminds you of just how good you have it as a North Carolina fan: This was the 229^th non-conference basketball game in the history of the Smith Center. It was just the 18^th loss.
Carolina led 2-0, and never again. After Armando Bacot made UNC’s first shot attempt, they missed their next seven and 12 of the next 13. The teams together combined to miss 13 of the first 16 shots, but then Marquette got hot while the Tar Heels got sloppy, and before you knew it the lead had ballooned to 10 at 14-4. Yet another example of the Tar Heels getting down by double-digits in the first half; seemingly the theme of the 2020-21 season.
From there, the Tar Heels made a nice 9-0 push to get within one point (14-13). But Marquette then went on their own 8-0 run and eventually pushed the lead out to as large as 18 in the first half.
February has been quite the turbulent month for the Tar Heels: They looked bad at Clemson, won at Duke, looked bad again at Virginia, throttled Northeastern and Louisville, and then looked downright uninterested tonight against Marquette.
Carolina’s first loss at home this season. The Tar Heels had previously been 8-0.
Hate to say it, but this loss is damaging to UNC’s NCAA Tournament resume. Why so? This will go down as a Quad 3 loss, marring an otherwise clean sheet against Quads 3 and 4. The Selection Committee does not look kindly on bubble teams with such blemishes.
Carolina’s night in a nutshell with just over a minute to go: Tar Heels got a steal off of full court pressure. Leaky Black tried to drop the ball off for Walker Kessler, who wasn’t looking. The ball bounced off of Kessler’s back and Marquette recovered.
Garrison Brooks scored his team-high 18^th point with 11:21 left in the game. At that point, he was shooting an extremely efficient 8-for-10 from the field. Here’s the kicker: Brooks never attempted another shot.
Aside from Brooks’ efficiency, Walker Kessler was the other bright spot for Carolina. The freshman has now strung together four straight solid performances. He’s averaging 9.75 points in that stretch.
Kerwin Walton “cooled off” tonight (by his standards). He still made two of his seven three-point attempts and now has an eight-game streak of hitting multiple threes. The difficult part tonight was that he shot 0-for-3 in the first half and by the time he finally started hitting, the hole was too deep.
As per usual, UNC held a sizable rebounding advantage on paper, but tonight they were unable to capitalize and only out-rebounded Marquette by one (36-35). The Tar Heels did hold a big advantage on the offensive glass (13-8), but only led the second chance points category 15-11. For a team that relies on offensive rebounds and second chance points, the margin has to be greater; particularly on an off-shooting night.
The Tar Heels once again assisted on more than half of their made baskets. Tonight the number was 13 assists on 25 field goals (52.0 percent). That makes five games in a row over 50 percent, and 12 of the last 14.
While the assist percentage was a positive, unfortunately precisely zero of the 13 assists came from the upperclassman group of leaders (Brooks, Platek, Black).
In a season where the Tar Heels tend to turn the ball over frequently, the 19 turnovers tonight was the third-highest total of the year (24 vs. Stanford, 20, vs. Miami). Strangely enough, Carolina won the other two games on that list.
Of the 10 Tar Heels who played, nine had at least one turnover. Only Armando Bacot finished with a zero in the turnover column.
The free throw numbers were a bit better at 15-for-22, although still sub-70 percent (68.2). One of the benefits tonight is that the free throws were divided more evenly among frontcourt and backcourt players.
Another positive takeaway is that Carolina continues to dominate the bench points. The tally for this game was 37-13 in favor of the Tar Heels. Over the past three games, the UNC bench has outscored the opponent’s bench by an average of 40.7 to 14.3.
Strange stat line for Caleb Love: one point on 0-for-6 shooting, 1-for-2 free throws, seven assists, three turnovers, zero rebounds. This was the first time in his young Tar Heel career that he did not make a single shot from the field.
Marquette consistently attacked with the dribble and Carolina could not consistently stop it. And when you can’t stop penetration, you over-help, which leads to open shots.
Marquette also made a habit of forcing the Tar Heels to switch a lot of screens and then took advantage of the mismatches.
The 16 point halftime deficit (45-29) was the deepest of the season. The previous high was 12, which has happened three times (Texas – 28-40, Iowa – 43-31, & Clemson 33-21).
Carolina outscored Marquette 41-38 in the second half. Great! The first half hole was just too much to overcome. When you are outscored by 18 at the three-point line in one half (six for Marquette in the first half, zero for Carolina), it’s going to be a tough night.
Perhaps the most confounding part of the night was the Tar Heels’ body language throughout the game. Several players portrayed through their demeanor that they had no hope for a Carolina comeback.
Game flow was herky-jerky, reminiscent of the 2017 National Championship. It didn’t help that the referees made several questionable calls, including a charge levied against Garrison Brooks with 15:32 left in the game. In real time, one of the announcers asked incredulously, “Is that a charge?” (meaning: "Did the refs really just call a charge on that play?"). Upon seeing the replay, he then said, “This is just a God-awful call. There’s no way around it. I don’t even think you’re in position to make that call.” Thankfully Kerwin Walton tipped Marquette’s ensuing inbounds pass to Leaky Black who finished with a vicious dunk in traffic, plus the foul. BALL DON’T LIE.
Carolina got the lead down to seven with 7:45 left in the second half, but was never able to chip away any further. Even in the midst of Marquette turning the ball over consistently post-halftime, the Tar Heels were rarely able to capitalize.

Box Score

Roy Williams postgame press conference

Players postgame press conference

RJ Davis

Garrison Brooks

Remember to check in for Quick Hitters after every North Carolina basketball game. Next up is a home game against Florida State on Saturday, February 27. Tip is at 4:00pm ET on ESPN.

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