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How exactly did Carolina lose to Georgia Tech Tuesday night?
If the Tar Heels played like they had in winning their first nine ACC games, nothing the Yellow Jackets could do would have mattered. And if Tech played the way it had in losing seven of its first nine conference games, UNC would have found a way, perhaps several ways, to win.
After all, Carolina looked to be writing the best story of the college basketball season, wiping away the ignominy of last year when the Heels began as the top-ranked team in the country and ended by turning down an NIT bid so Hubert Davis could get cracking on fixing what was broken.
It was to be a game between two point guards (both wearing No. 2) who graduated from high school early and reclassified to become freshmen in the ACC, once the greatest league in college hoops.
Elliot Cadeau was expected to win that battle, on his reputation if nothing else. Cadeau was coming off his two best college games, with 30 points and 9 assists in wins over Wake Forest and at Florida State.
Naithan George came in as the second-best assist man in the ACC with over 5 per game. Cadeau wasn’t exactly chopped liver, 10th in the league with 3.7 per game. Like Cadeau, George was far more a facilitator than a scorer.
Cadeau played only 21 minutes, which usually happens when the other team has big guards that calls for 6-4 Seth Trimble to play more. This time, Cadeau might have broken a record they don’t even keep by committing five fouls in about eight minutes of time in the second half, finishing with 5 points.
George played 30 minutes and had 16 points including the game winner on a fall-way layup over Armando Bacot. He also had 4 rebounds and 4 assists. George made 8 of 10 free throws, missing the only two Tech did not make after coming in at 67 percent, 14th in the ACC.
In another converse relationship, UNC made only 9 of 17 after hitting better than 75 percent from the stripe.
Plus, the Jackets’ Baye Ndongo left with an injury and without a rebound after four minutes and did not return. He was the ACC’s second-leading rebounder, but his replacements grabbed 20 in his absence. Bacot had another tepid game with 9 boards and 9 points with two of his shots blocked.
The other mind-blowing stat was the poor-shooting Yellow Jackets hit 9 of 20 3-pointers, the last on an unintended banker that went in. The Heels had two terrible halves and made just 8 of 28 from the arc, with reputed long-baller Cormac Ryan going 3 for 10 and dropping his season average to 30 percent.
That’s how it happened, and may it be just a one-off.
Featured image via Associated Press/Alex Slitz
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