North Carolina Tar Heels: Pitt Win A Good Sign for Future
The North Carolina Tar Heels recovered from their Miami loss to beat the Panthers.
The North Carolina Tar Heels defeated the Pitt Panthers 80-78 last night to keep a share of first place in the Atlantic Coast Conference. The Tar Heels were once again without Theo Pinson, but at least he was not in a walking boot like he was in the Miami game. The Heels also got some help from the home crowd.
The Miami game had reopened questions about the Tar Heels that some thought had been answered. Could the team win without Pinson? Can the team win on an off night from Joel Berry? Against Pitt, one of those questions got answered. The team can manage to win without Pinson. Here are three things to learn from the game:
- Don’t Knock Pitt
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Despite the Panthers coming in at the bottom of the league, this Pitt team has some good flashes. Jamel Artis (17 points) did not go off for forty in this game, but Pitt got a good game from Michael Young (19 points) and three point shooter Cameron Johnson (24 points). That combination would have sunk other teams they played this season.
Also it is good to remember that Kevin Stallings is the Pitt coach these days. The former Kansas assistant and secret scrimmage Vanderbilt coach should know more than anybody about how to deal with a Roy Williams team.
- The return of Berry
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Want an easy answer to why Miami beat the Heels by fifteen? Try Berry not scoring a field goal. Part of that was a bad matchup, but part of that was a stinker of a game. Berry responded in this game by finding his three ball early and offering some offense outside of that three ball as the game progressed to get to the foul line.
Berry did log thirty-seven minutes in a much tighter rotation than normal for the Heels. With that in mind, Berry and Justin Jackson (thirty-eight minutes) are probably looking forward to the return of Pinson most.
- In the Hicks of Time
Isaiah Hicks also had one of his bigger contributions in the scoring of this game. Defensively he was forced to chase around smaller players like Young as Pitt played a single post most of the game. Offensively these mismatches allowed him to show some extra aggression. Hicks displayed a driving game that he had only hinted at in earlier performances. He was also a big part of the renewed offensive rebounding effort that was missing against Miami.
Next: Ryan Switzer and Comparisons
It does look like the Tar Heels may have got away with one here, but they did establish some ideas that will be useful against Notre Dame. They still would love to have Pinson back, because they never set up their offense down low like they could have in this game.