During his radio show on Tuesday, UNC head coach Hubert Davis mentioned his team would be focused on getting the ball to junior forward Armando Bacot at NC State on Saturday.
“They don’t have very much depth in the frontcourt,” Davis said. “And that’s something that we can take advantage of with Brady and also Armando down low on the block.”
Needless to say, Bacot and the Tar Heels took advantage. The All-ACC candidate delivered perhaps the best performance of his career against the Wolfpack, feasting inside with 28 points on 11-13 shooting to go along with 18 rebounds, five blocks, two steals and an assist. He is the first UNC player ever to record a line of 20+ points, 15+ rebounds and 5+ blocks in a game.
It was all part of an 84-74 win for Carolina in a game which, like the team’s 100-80 victory over the Wolfpack in Chapel Hill, wasn’t nearly that close.
𝐇𝐄𝐄𝐋𝐒 𝐖𝐈𝐍.#CarolinaFamily | @WellsFargo pic.twitter.com/15UIXGecAF
— Carolina Basketball (@UNC_Basketball) February 26, 2022
Bacot got started early, scoring Carolina’s first six points of the game and eight of its first 11. Everything seemed to be going the way of the Tar Heels after sophomore guard Caleb Love banked in a three-pointer, and graduate forward Brady Manek followed that up with a triple which bounced in after hitting the top of the backboard. UNC held a lead as large as 24-5 after fewer than eight minutes had been played.
Bacot secured his 22nd double-double of the season before halftime, inching himself closer to the all-time school record of 24. Bacot is currently tied with Billy Cunningham and one behind Brice Johnson on the single-season leaderboard.
The Wolfpack rallied to within nine points toward the end of the half, but points from Manek, Puff Johnson, R.J. Davis and Love sent the Tar Heels to the locker room up by a comfortable 17-point margin at 46-29.
The mood was soured, though, after senior wing Leaky Black went down with a non-contact knee injury shortly before halftime. Black stayed on the ground clutching his right knee before getting up and gingerly walking back to the locker room. A mere two days before Black’s senior night Monday against Syracuse, it appeared to be an unfathomably cruel break for one of the Tar Heels’ most beloved players.
But Black would come back out in uniform for the Tar Heels for pre-second half warmups, sporting a compression sleeve on his right knee. His injury was diagnosed as a hyperextension. It was certainly not as bad as Carolina fans feared, but still puts his playing status for Monday in jeopardy, though Hubert Davis said the injury was not serious. Black did not play at all in the second half on Saturday.
For the most part, the Tar Heels didn’t need him. Bacot continued to dominate, scoring UNC’s first five points of the half and recording three of his five blocks in the period. Sophomore Puff Johnson, playing in place of Black, proved to be a revelation off the bench. Johnson scored a career-high 16 points against the Wolfpack, 12 of which came in the second half. He knocked down two consecutive three-pointers to push Carolina’s lead to 19, before back-to-back dunks from Bacot forced NC State to call a timeout, down 71-48. Bacot’s second dunk came when no Wolfpack defenders were in his area code.
It was academic from that point on, with Carolina letting off the gas and allowing the lead to be whittled down to a smaller margin than does the game justice. NC State scored the final nine points of the game to make the final deficit just 10 points. It hadn’t been that small since the late first half.
Aside from Bacot, both Love and Manek joined Johnson with 16 points each, though they achieved those lines in very different ways. Love didn’t make another three after banking in his first, finishing 4-14 from the field but 7-7 from the foul line. Manek shot a tidy 6-9 from the field (2-5 from downtown), and added six rebounds and five assists (which ties a season-high) to complete an outstanding all-around performance.
After finishing off its regular-season sweep of the Wolfpack, UNC now moves to 21-8 overall and 13-5 in conference play. Carolina is closing in on clinching a double-bye in the ACC Tournament, and once again avoided a pitfall in a “Can’t Lose” game for its NCAA Tournament resume. A visit from Syracuse Monday night also falls into that category, and Carolina may have to face the Orange’s 2-3 zone defense without the services of Black.
After that, UNC will visit Duke for head coach Mike Krzyzewski’s home finale next Saturday. A loss there wouldn’t do much damage to Carolina’s March Madness hopes. A win? That may be an automatic berth.
So goes life on the NCAA Tournament Bubble.
Featured image via Todd Melet. For a full photo gallery of the game, click here.
Chapelboro.com does not charge subscription fees, and you can directly support our efforts in local journalism here. Want more of what you see on Chapelboro? Let us bring free local news and community information to you by signing up for our biweekly newsletter.
Comments on Chapelboro are moderated according to our Community Guidelines