Missed Opportunities Doom No. 7 UNC in Loss at No. 3 Virginia

For all the talk hyping the No. 7 UNC men’s basketball team as championship contenders, the results against the ACC’s top teams have not quite backed it up to this point.

A blowout home win against Miami the only outlier, the Tar Heels are now 1-4 against ranked teams inside the conference after Saturday’s 79-74 loss in Charlottesville against No. 3 Virginia.

The Cavaliers were in control of the game throughout, holding at least a share of the lead for the final 34 minutes—knocking UNC back to 23-6 overall and into a tie atop the ACC with Miami at 12-4 in conference play.

Virginia improves to 22-6 in all games and 11-5 in the league thanks to a super-human performance by senior guard Malcolm Brogdon, who scored 15 of his 26 points in the first 12 minutes of the night.

Afterwards, UNC head coach Roy Williams gave high praise to the Cavaliers’ star before lamenting his team’s missed opportunities.

“Malcolm in the first half was about as good a performance we’ve had against us this season,” Williams said. “Maybe in several years.

“But we couldn’t quite get over the hump.”

It wasn’t that the Tar Heels played poorly, by any means.

They just came up short in the moments that mattered most—again.

UNC shot better percentages from both two and three-point range, and won the rebounding battle. Sophomore guard Joel Berry even had a career-high 21 points and five three-pointers.

Anytime the Tar Heels appeared to have an opening, though, Virginia snuffed it out right away.

Some wondered if senior forward Brice Johnson, who scored 12 points on nine shots, should have seen the ball more. On other nights, that may be a quality argument—but this game was about timely plays, and Virginia clearly won that battle.

“Second half against Duke we couldn’t throw the ball in the ocean,” Williams said, referring to the last controversy surrounding Johnson’s touches. “Today, I think we shot 50 percent in the second half so just because we didn’t throw it to Brice, it didn’t kill our offense.”

For a portrait of how the night played out, both Johnson and Justin Jackson missed the first free throw of “one-and-one” chances that could have tightened the game in the final six minutes—and each time the misses ended up leading to points for the Cavaliers, who handed the Tar Heels their fifth road loss of the season.

“Some teams play exceptionally well wherever they play,” Williams said after the game. “Some teams play much, much harder at home.

“But down the stretch Virginia had a greater purpose tonight,” the coach added. “Why they had it, I don’t know. I think against Miami we had a greater sense of purpose.”

As minor as a couple of missed free throws may seem, it’s those plays that often decide the outcome of games between teams as talented and highly-ranked as UNC and Virginia.

Whether it’s a failure to call timeout late against Duke or blowing a 15-point lead against Notre Dame—this Tar Heel team has yet to show the killer instinct that wins championships.

“It’s all those little things that made them end up with more points than we did,” Williams said. “But I thought the biggest factor of the game, to me, is that [Virginia] had played with a high level of intensity—from my point of view—on both offense and defense.

“I think they were the actors and we were the reactors the whole night.”

Up Next:

Just two regular season games remain on the schedule for the Tar Heels, beginning with Monday’s final home game against Syracuse.

The return game with Duke at Cameron Indoor Stadium is set for next Saturday.

Game Notes:

• Senior guard Marcus Paige continued to struggle for UNC, scoring 13 points but on just 4-of-13 shooting.
• Virginia turned the ball over just eight times compared to the Tar Heels’ 13 and made 18 of its 21 free throws. UNC shot 7-of-13 from the foul line.
• Freshman forward Luke Maye received five minutes of playing time, including during the second half, thanks to foul trouble amongst the Tar Heel big men.

 

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