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It isn’t often that a two-year starting center enters her senior season and suddenly has to adjust to coming off the bench. That became Anya Poole’s plight after Carolina brought in junior transfer Maria Gakdeng from Boston College in the offseason. The 6–3 center has started every game this season for the No. 23 Tar Heels.
No. 4 North Carolina continues to rise in men’s bracket projections, while a women’s projection suggests the No. 23 Tar Heels have work to do to host the first two rounds.
In Hubert Davis’ 2½ seasons as North Carolina’s head coach, he’s always had a couple of schools of thought about how he uses his bench. One is that every player must be ready because their chance will come; Davis just can’t say when that will happen. Those chances are happening much more often than in his first two seasons.
After two impressive ACC victories and five teams at the top of last week’s men’s basketball poll losing, North Carolina jumped three spots to a season-high No. 4 in the latest AP Top 25 and got one first-place vote.
CHAPEL HILL — On a day that Carolina celebrated the 30th anniversary of the 1994 national championship team, the Tar Heels showed they are stacking the talent and moving the program closer to adding another championship banner to the Carmichael Arena rafters soon. But this season’s team couldn’t deliver the knockout punch until a late 8–0 run against a feisty bunch from Virginia.
The good news for Caleb Love is that he scored 28 points and five 3-pointers. The bad news was that he needed 25 shots to get them, missed a potential game-tying 3-point attempt with six seconds left, and his No. 10 Arizona team lost 73–70 at unranked Washington State.
It’s always a challenge to predict what a Carolina win will do to the Tar Heels’ NET ranking, and the 103–67 Saturday home victory over Syracuse was no exception. The win knocked the Orange down five spots to 80 in the NET rankings, moving the victory from barely a Quad 2 to a Quad 3.
CHAPEL HILL — No. 7 North Carolina’s offense shifted into overdrive by turning up the pressure inside against smaller Syracuse and administering a beatdown. With a top-five ranking likely coming, the Tar Heels showed they are one of the country’s best teams and the deepest they’ve been in a few seasons.
With one legendary shot, Charlotte Smith cemented her spot in Carolina women’s basketball history, but not without some anxious moments and confusion coming out of the huddle.
No. 20 North Carolina took many of No. 21 Florida State’s best punches over the first 2½ quarters but the Seminoles had trouble delivering the knockout punch. Deja Kelly wouldn’t let that happen as she ensured the Tar Heels fought back … until she fouled out on a questionable call with 5:05 left.
Co-hosts Desmond Johnson and R.L. Bynum recap No. 7 Carolina’s victory at N.C. State, where the Tar Heels are after starting ACC play 4–0 and talk about the rivalry.
Tyler Nickel showed off the potential UNC fans all knew he had in helping Virginia Tech pull off an upset of No. 21 Clemson on Wednesday night.
You would expect that after No. 7 North Carolina earned its fourth Quad 1 win in five games, the Tar Heels would again move up in the NET rankings, but predicting the metric is difficult.
RALEIGH — After a less-than-artistic offensive showing in the first half, Carolina coach Hubert Davis told his team at halftime to attack the basket, and N.C. State was helpless to stop the Tar Heels.
CHAPEL HILL — A big part of why No. 7 North Carolina is playing so well is the Tar Heels’ cohesiveness on defense, which they say is built around trust. UNC (11–3, 3–0 ACC) has held two consecutive opponents to fewer than 60 points for the first time in nine seasons and is No. 16 in the country in defensive efficiency.
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