The first half seemed stuck in mud. The second half was played in a boxing ring.
In a game that at times resembled basketball, Carolina found a gutsy road win it desperately needed to keep its NCAA Tournament hopes alive, pushing past Clemson 79-77 on a layup from Brady Manek with 3.1 seconds left.
𝐅𝐈𝐍𝐀𝐋.#CarolinaFamily | @WellsFargo pic.twitter.com/4lHDNs004d
— Carolina Basketball (@UNC_Basketball) February 9, 2022
The win moves UNC to 17-7 on the season and 9-4 in conference play. And while it falls just outside of Quad 1 territory, the victory keeps Carolina undefeated in Quad 2, 3 and 4 games this season. They are the only ACC team with no such losses yet.
Carolina fans may have felt compelled to turn the game off early after the Tar Heels went down 8-0 early. UNC struggled mightily against the Clemson defense in the first half, at one point having more turnovers (5) than made baskets (3).
The good news? The Tigers were in equally dire straits, going more than three minutes without a basket late in the half. Carolina used the dry spell to get back in the game, with powerful inside play from junior forward Armando Bacot and better defensive intensity giving the team a 30-25 halftime lead.
“We just started defending,” Davis said. “I felt like… in the middle of the first half, we started defending, we started rebounding, and we started taking care of the basketball.”
To Davis’ point, after committing five turnovers in the first eight minutes, Carolina only committed nine in the remaining 32.
The Tar Heels expanded their lead to a game-high nine points at 39-30 in the second half, but the Tigers rallied after a flagrant foul was called on Manek on a fast break. Two free throws plus a three-pointer from Alex Hemenway gave Clemson a five-point possession, and the game remained tight from there.
“Road games are never easy, so our main thing was just, ‘Remain together,'” said sophomore guard R.J. Davis, who finished with 16 points. “And I think we showed some grit.”
It certainly took grit to get through a nervy second half. Neither team led by more than five points after Hemenway’s three-pointer. It appeared UNC may have some cushion after a Davis three-pointer made it 54-49, but Bacot was called for a flagrant foul down low. Though the basket counted, Clemson earned two free throws (which it converted) and the ball.
The foul was Bacot’s fourth, forcing him to the bench with UNC clinging to its small advantage. From that point on, the game would be played within a six-point window.
In the absence of Bacot, Clemson’s six-foot, 10-inch P.J. Hall began to dominate down low. Still without sophomore forward Dawson Garcia, Hubert Davis’ hand was forced: he sent Bacot back in with 6:29 remaining and the score tied at 64.
Carolina took the lead back on a tough running layup by Davis, but the sophomore guard was immediately called for a technical foul after the basket for shouting something in the direction of the referee.
“I can’t comment on that,” Davis said when asked about the foul.
Clemson made both of its free throws to tie the game again at 68 apiece. After a Bacot free throw, Carolina once again threatened to pull away on a three-pointer from Leaky Black in the corner. The basket gave Black 11 points on the game, all of which came in the second half. He’s scored in double figures in three of Carolina’s last six games.
“He’s been huge for us these last few weeks,” Bacot said of Black. “Really all season. Just him getting his confidence and really just finding himself has been huge for us.”
But five consecutive points from Hall gave Clemson the lead right back, and after a short jumper from Manek, it was Hall again taking advantage of Bacot’s four fouls for a layup. Down a point, Carolina moved to set up a play when disaster struck: Bacot plowed over his defender in the paint and was called for an offensive foul, his fifth, with a minute to go. It was just the third time he’s fouled out all season.
“It definitely was a helpless feeling,” Bacot said of watching the final minute from the bench. “Because I just wanted to be out there with the guys. I kind of got it going today, and I usually play a lot more minutes, too.”
That final sequence would test the mettle of a team which wilted when Bacot exited in the first half against Duke. But Clemson offered a lifeline when Hall committed an offensive foul on the other end, giving the ball back to Carolina scot-free. Sophomore guard Caleb Love, mired in an ugly shooting slump, took advantage, nailing his second three-pointer of the half to give Carolina the lead again.
“I was talking to Caleb… and I told him, ‘Keep your head up, you’re gonna make a big play,'” R.J. Davis said. “I’m proud of him. That’s my brother.”
Hall once again tied the game on the ensuing possession, laying in his 23rd and 24th points of the night over Manek. With the shot clock off and 15 seconds remaining, Hubert Davis called timeout, and told his team he wanted to be home for supper.
“I said, ‘Let’s try not to go into overtime. Let’s win this game in regulation so we can get home at a good hour of the night,'” Davis said. “And they all started laughing. I think it loosened them up a little bit.”
From the bench, Bacot never lost faith in the cause, even if it wouldn’t be him putting in the game-winning shot. He credited Carolina’s overtime win at Louisville last week with that.
“I just felt confident enough that, not like early on in the season, I knew we would be poised enough to make the right plays, and just be smart,” he said.
Davis put the ball in Love’s hands. Though his shooting numbers were still subpar, and he had five turnovers to his name, the head coach had confidence in his sophomore guard. Having just hit the three-pointer, Love got past his defender in the lane, then jumped as if to take a layup before passing to a wide open Manek under the basket. The graduate transfer laid it in with 3.1 seconds left. It gave him 11 points, and more importantly gave Carolina a 79-77 lead.
“I think it shows a lot about how tough Caleb is, how resilient he is” Davis said of the final possession. “I’m just so proud of him. There were times where he made mistakes, but it’s about making big plays in big moments. And we don’t win this game without Caleb.”
Carolina only walked away with the victory after Clemson’s desperation three-pointer clanged off the rim. It snapped a brief two-game losing streak to the Tigers, who had dealt the Tar Heels one of their more devastating losses in 2020 by hitting a similar last-second shot in the Smith Center to force overtime.
As one of the only members of the team who played in that game, Bacot admitted he was more nervous than most on Clemson’s final look.
“I had a little PTSD from my freshman year,” he said. “All those game-winners we lost on, I’m just glad finally I was on the right end of that.”
He wasn’t the only one.
Featured image via 247 Sports
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