We’re heading into a fortnight when it will be determined how the UNC football season plays out along with indications of what Carolina basketball may do in the long run.
Mack Brown’s third season will forever remain a relative disappointment, given the high bar he and the attending media set before the first ball was kicked off. But with Brown’s penchant for ever adjusting his goals, his Tar Heels still have a lot to play for after the following failures:
- College Football Playoff gone after the first game at Virginia Tech.
- Nine or 10 wins gone after bad losses at Georgia Tech and at home to Florida State, both of which are unlikely to qualify for bowl games.
- Eight wins to match last year’s regular season gone after getting monsooned in overtime at Pitt.
With bowl eligibility assured by beating 1-8 Wofford this Saturday on Senior Day, Carolina can be playing the role of big-time spoiler at N.C. State come Black Friday. The Heels could possibly knock the Wolfpack out of winning the Atlantic Division and a spot in the ACC championship game for the first time.
The last, and noteworthy, goal left for Brown in Year 3 is to claim the mythical “state championship” for the second straight season. UNC has already beaten Duke and Wake Forest, so “winning the state” has always been a big recruiting chit for Mack; almost as important as prime time nationally televised games because Brown builds programs from the inside out.
Winning out for a 7-5 regular-season and victory in a cheesy (not necessarily the Cheez-It) bowl game against what will surely be an overmatched opponent would give the Tar Heels eight victories to match the 2020-win total. Brown can add that to his recruiting rap in closing out the class of 2022 and whoever may pop up in the transfer portal.
The loss to Pitt, on Veteran’s Day to a seriously veteran team, will continue to sting, and Brown is likely to face media questions this week on his controversial statement that he “got talked out of” going for the win on fourth and goal. Whatever happened, he is the head coach/CEO and the buck stops with him.
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Hubert Davis and his coaching staff wore camo pullovers in the surprisingly tough win over well-coached and underrated Brown (picked fifth in the Ivy League) Friday night. A larger and much more active crowd watched the Tar Heels come back from six points down, thanks to a turned-on defense that finally cooled off the Bears, who shot over 60 percent for most of the game while hanging in there without one of its best (injured) players.
Some sweet shooting from sophomore R.J. Davis helped UNC men’s basketball complete a comeback on Friday and move to 2-0. (Photo via Todd Melet.)
The 2-0 Tar Heels got an inside-outside boost from Armando Bacot’s fast start and a spark from co-bigs Dawson Garcia and Brady Manek in the second half before turning to RJ Davis and Caleb Love to deliver the daggers late. The undersized RJ plays so freaking hard, and his teammates (including Love’s 5 assists) got him the ball for open 3-pointers that he made for a career high 6 and total of 26 points.
The hoop Heels now face their first decidedly difficult week of a season that gets more so in December (Michigan, at Georgia Tech and UCLA). They begin with a true road test at College of Charleston, which was also a second-division pick in the Colonial Athletic Association but loves to shoot the 3 ball and will try to outscore Carolina by launching them on Tuesday night at 8:30.
“We don’t have any problem scoring,” Hubert Davis said after the 94-87 win over Brown. “It’s the defense we need to work on.”
Tar Heel perimeter defenders could not keep Brown’s passing and cutting guards in front of them for the first 32 minutes. With the score tied at 74, the Bears made only 5 of their last 18 shots and overall committed just 5 turnovers, the second-fewest ever by an opponent in the Smith Center (Carolina had only 7).
If RJ fueled the finish, the front court ignited the rally. Bacot made 10 of his 11 shots to get into the UNC record book for field goal accuracy, but it was Garcia who started and then sat early in the second half before contributing a steal, two rebounds and six points.
Then Manek went to work from both the paint and the perimeter to wind up with 14 points, three under his average so far. He continues with Garcia to shore up the loss of three top post players from last season. Here are some interesting two-game notes:
- Manek made his first 3-pointer and has missed his last 6, is shooting 12-for-24 from the field and averaging 6.5 rebounds in 30-plus minutes per game.
- Garcia is 1-4 from 3-point range, averaging 9.5 points and 7.5 rebounds in 25 minutes per game. A small, but significant, sample size.
- Walker Kessler is 0-5 on 3-pointers, shooting 40 percent overall and averaging 4 points and 5 rebounds in 21.5 minutes as an Auburn starter.
- Also, according to analytics expert Adrian Atkinson, through two games UNC is +57.3 points with senior Leaky Black on the court and -21.6 with him on the bench (per 40 minutes).
The first week of college basketball featured scary ninth-ranked Duke’s impressive win over No. 10 Kentucky and second-ranked UCLA’s overtime edging of No. 4 Villanova in a late ESPN game from Pauley Pavilion.
The top 20 Tar Heels will either rise in the polls or fall out with the game at Charleston and as an underdog against seventh-ranked Purdue and either No. 17 Tennessee or ‘Nova at the Hall of Fame Tip-Off this weekend at the Mohegan Sun in Uncasville, Connecticut.
After that, we’ll find out how the football Heels finish up the regular season. As a last bit of editorial comment, Carolina is bad match-up for NC State even with the game in Raleigh.
Going into Saturday night’s ACC headliner at Wake Forest, the Wolfpack’s defense was first in scoring and second in total yards. State will surely slow down Sam Howell and the Heels’ fourth-ranked offense, but the ninth-rated Pack attack does not have enough firepower to outscore whatever the Tar Heels and Howell can accomplish.
Photo via AP Photo/Keith Srakocic.
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