Carolina begins its run back to the rankings tonight versus Syracuse.
The latest college basketball rankings came out yesterday, and I was anxious to see if the 7-4 Tar Heels had sneaked back into the top 25 after narrow wins against Notre Dame at home and at Miami. I wasn’t surprised they didn’t make it back in, but I was shocked when I checked the listing below of other teams receiving votes. I looked at the list twice and saw North Carolina State but not UNC.
Roy Williams’ young team has not played well enough to stay ranked, but its four losses were to fourth-ranked Texas, at No. 5 Iowa and at N.C. State and Georgia Tech. Wins over UNLV, Stanford and Kentucky were all on neutral courts.
All losses were away from home, where Carolina resumes play tonight against the unranked Orange, a game that was COVID called off back on January 2. The Heels were supposed to play No. 9 Clemson at home last Saturday night, but that one was also postponed.
So the team has had a week to keep improving, and the schedule for the next two weeks is conducive to building an NCAA tournament resume. After Syracuse comes a visit to Florida State, followed by home games against Wake Forest and a rematch with the Wolfpack, plus a visit to Pitt. All those are winnable games and also losable if the Heels can’t cut back on their turnovers and start shooting better.
But the talent is there to rally from seven down against the Irish and 10 down to the Hurricanes when both games looked lost. They have gotten boosts from senior Andrew Playtek, junior Leaky Black and freshman Kerwin Walton on the offensive end to partially make up for the cold shooting of Caleb Love and RJ Davis.
The four post players have all had either good games or good moments, and their offensive rebounding has kept them in all of their games. Day’Ron Sharpe, whom Williams calls potentially the best rebounder he’s ever coached, and Armando Bacot have been the leading scorers and rebounders while Garrison Brooks works to get out of his senior slump.
This would be a good coming together time.
Featured image via ACC Media
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