By R.L. Bynum

Hubert Davis gained a permanent place in the hearts of Carolina fans with the two wins last season over Duke, but he may have done one of the best coaching jobs of his short tenure Saturday at Madison Square Garden.

Davis trusted his team even after falling behind by 14 points in the first half, and they came through.

After a spirited halftime speech, Davis made a defensive change and deftly guided the Tar Heels through the end of regulation. Davis made all the right moves in the 89–84 overtime victory over No. 23 Ohio State in the CBS Sports Classic at Madison Square Garden in New York.

Unlike many other coaches, Davis doesn’t need profanity to communicate his message. He didn’t need to curse to get his team’s attention after seeing a lot he didn’t like in the first half.  

The volume of his voice said it all.

He got the attention of Armando Bacot and Caleb Love, who led the second-half rally, and the rest of the team.

“I was direct. I was straightforward. I didn’t speak in tongues or interpretation,” Davis said. “They knew exactly where I was coming from. That’s the way I always communicate. But I did it with a higher volume at halftime, and Armando and Caleb have said they like the higher volume from me. So I’m going to continue to do that.”

Bacot had already jump-started the Tar Heels by scoring 15 of their final 21 first-half points on his way to his fifth consecutive double-double with 28 points and 15 rebounds.

“Coach came in at halftime and gave us a moving speech,” Bacot said. “In the first half, they punked us early. In the second half, I thought we did a good job coming out early.”

Davis said that Ohio State outrebounded his team, was more physical, got to more loose balls, and beat the Tar Heels to just about everything.

That had to change, and he let the Tar Heels know about it.

“At halftime, we talked about [how] there needed to be a response and for things to change,” Davis said. “A level of toughness and physicality needed to be brought to play against such a great team in Ohio State. The did that in the second half, not only in the defensive end, but I think on the offensive end as well in terms of getting to their spots and getting to the shots they wanted.”

After battling back to make a game of it, it would have been all for nothing if Davis didn’t coolly navigate the last two seconds of regulation. Carolina was down two and had to go the length of the court to tie it or win it with a 3-pointer.

There was no panic as Davis told the Tar Heels what was next, in a sequence that led to Pete Nance hitting a short turnaround jumper at the regulation buzzer to force overtime.

“I just didn’t think we could get a clean shot going full court,” Davis said. “So, I just drew up a play that gave us three options to catch the ball near half-court. I told them, ‘once you catch it, it’s a little bit over two seconds, you have one dribble, and you’ve got to get it over half-court to call timeout. If you get it over half court, then you can advance the basketball.’ ”

That part went perfectly, and it helped that Ohio State didn’t guard Leaky Black as he threw in the inbounds pass. Black tossed it to RJ Davis, who quickly moved past half-court and called a timeout.

“The execution of that play was probably just as or more important than the one to Pete,” Coach Davis said.

As for the next step, Coach Davis said that they had several late-clock, late-game situation plays that they’ve practiced but didn’t have one for that situation with 1.2 seconds left.

That’s where assistant coach Jeff Lebo jumped into action.

“Their execution was fantastic to get the ball across half-court to get us into a position where we can run that play, and then Coach Lebo thought that we could get the ball to Pete because of his lift, just throw it up. They weren’t going to foul him,” Davis said. “One of the things Pete loves to do is he loves that side of the block and he loves that turnaround jumper. Not that he was going to hit it, but that’s a shot he likes to take and takes all the time.”

https://twitter.com/Julius71720049/status/1604304199625461761

Black, who was a game-high +27, made another excellent pass to get the ball to Nance, who just did release his shot in time. The ball swished through and the game headed to overtime.

“At the end of the day, it’s about executing,” Davis said. “You can write up all the plays that you want. It’s a make-or-miss game. Pete stepped up and made them and gave us an opportunity to go into overtime.”

Here’s the play Jeff Lebo drew up in the huddle.

He saw Penn State run something similar earlier this year and tried it on a whim.

Armando Bacot and Leaky Black almost bailed on it.

Then Pete Nance shot Leaky a look—and the Garden burst. pic.twitter.com/mBkAnpbFIA

— Matt Norlander (@MattNorlander) December 18, 2022

The problem was that the Tar Heels never had even practiced that play, so Davis had to trust that Black and Nance would execute. The second-year head coach had that trust, considering the team had already dealt with tense late-game situations, and the Tar Heels didn’t let him down.

“There’s tremendous trust,” Davis said. “Just because we run a play that we never run in practice, we’re together in practice every day. We share time together. So, the time spent together builds that trust to let everybody be involved. And one of the things that I tell the guys all the time — and this is a great example — nobody can do it by themselves. You always need help. You’ve got to do it together.”

The shift defensively was pressing more after an RJ Davis free throw cut the deficit to 66-55 with seven minutes left in regulation, which led to an immediate turnover. A couple of possessions later, the Tar Heels stopped guarding the inbounds passer and instead had Nance apply double teams, which led to a five-second violation a minute after the change.

It all produced four turnovers shortly after the switch.

“We did it for the first time against Virginia Tech, and at that point, we were down by 18 and cut it to three,” Davis said. “It just felt like our starters were in there so much, so it’s hard to do that for an entire game. Their ability to get deflections and steals, get turnovers, speed up the game, I thought it was huge. They’ve been fantastic with it all year.”

The four-overtime game against Alabama at the Phil Knight Invitational in Portland last month didn’t produce a victory, but it gave Carolina valuable experience in tense situations.

“I do think it helped; I do,” Davis said. “I think it helped from the standpoint of making me not want to go four overtimes. I also think the experience of being in the position a number of times in that game for the outcome to be different and to let’s learn from that. Let’s grow from it.”

The Tar Heels had been there before and were determined to produce a different outcome. Davis said that his team needed to understand what to do in terms of execution on both ends of the floor.

“It would be great if we could learn those type of lessons by winning everything,” he said. That didn’t happen. I’m very proud of the way they responded to that.”

Carolina is now 8–4, has won three consecutive games after four losses in a row, and has the sort of win that can dictate the trajectory of a season heading into ACC play.

Tar Heels fans should, again, be proud of how Davis responded as a coach in a big-time game on a big-time stage in a big-time venue.

UNC statistics

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Date	Month/day	Time/score	Opponent/event (current ranking)	Location	Record
	October
28	Friday	W, 101–40	Johnson C. Smith	Home	Exhibition
	November
7	Monday	W, 69–56	UNCW	Home	1–0
11	Friday	W, 102–86	College of Charleston	Home	2–0
15	Tuesday	W, 72–66	Gardner-Webb	Home	3–0
20	Sunday	W, 80–64	James Madison	Home	4–0
			Phil Knight Invitational
24	Thursday	W, 89–81	First round: Portland	Portland	5–0
25	Friday	L, 70–65	Semifinals: Iowa State	Portland	5–1
27	Sunday	L, 103–101, 4 OTs	Consolation: No. 1 Alabama	Portland	5–2
			ACC/Big Ten Challenge
30	Wednesday	L, 77–65	No. 21 Indiana	Bloomington, Ind.	5–3
	December
4	Sunday	L, 80–72	Virginia Tech	Blacksburg, Va.	5–4, 0–1 ACC
10	Saturday	W, 75–59	Georgia Tech	Home	6–4, 1–1 ACC
13	Tuesday	W, 100–67	The Citadel	Home	7–4
			CBS Sports Classic
17	Saturday	W, 89–84, OT	Ohio State	New York	8–4
			Jumpman Invitational
21	Wednesday	W, 80–76	Michigan	Charlotte	9–4
30	Friday	L, 76–74	Pittsburgh	Pittsburgh	9–5, 1–2 ACC
	January
4	Wednesday	W, 88–79	Wake Forest	Home	10–5, 2–2 ACC
7	Saturday	W, 81–64	Notre Dame	Home	11–5, 3–2 ACC
10	Tuesday	L, 65–58	No. 14 Virginia	Charlottesville	11–6, 3–3 ACC
14	Saturday	W, 80–59	Louisville	Louisville, Ky.	12–6, 4–3 ACC
17	Tuesday	W, 72–64	Boston College	Home	13–6, 5–3 ACC
21	Saturday	W, 80–69	N.C. State	Home	14–6, 6–3 ACC
24	Tuesday	W, 72–68	Syracuse	Syracuse, N.Y.	15–6, 7–3 ACC
	February
1	Wednesday	L, 65–64	Pittsburgh	Home	15–7, 7–4 ACC
4	Saturday	L, 63–57	No. 12 Duke	Durham	15–8, 7–5 ACC
7	Tuesday	L, 92–85	Wake Forest	Winston-Salem	15–9, 7–6 ACC
11	Saturday	W, 91–71	Clemson	Home	16–9, 8–6 ACC
13	Monday	L, 80–72	No. 16 Miami	Home	16–10, 8–7 ACC
19	Sunday	L, 77–69	N.C. State	Raleigh	16–11, 8–8 ACC
22	Wednesday	W, 63–59	Notre Dame	South Bend, Ind.	17–11, 9–8 ACC
25	Saturday	W, 71–63	No. 14 Virginia	Home	18–11, 10–8 ACC
27	Monday	W, 77–66	Florida State	Tallahassee, Fla.	19–11, 11–8 ACC
	March
4	Saturday	L, 62–57	No. 12 Duke	Home	19–12, 11–9 ACC
			ACC tournament
8	Wednesday	W, 85–61	Boston College	Greensboro	20–12
9	Thursday	L, 68–59	No. 14 Virginia	Greensboro	20–13

Top photo via @UNC_Basketball