Hurricanes Lose to North Carolina 73-64
CORAL GABLES, Fla. — The North Carolina Tar Heels lead the nation in scoring and rebounding. They showed Miami they can be good on defense, too.
Sputtering on offense and evenly matched on the boards, North Carolina (No. 7 ESPN/USA Today, No. 8 AP) used smothering defense to erase an eight-point deficit in the second half and beat Miami 73-64 Wednesday night.
The Tar Heels, who came in averaging 83.5 points, shot only 38 percent and went 5 for 18 from 3-point range. But they forced turnovers on four consecutive possessions in the second half to get back in the game, and held Miami without a point for nearly five minutes down the stretch.
“Defensively we can be a very good team,” said center Tyler Zeller, who was held to nine points but made three steals. “We can win games in the 50s and 60s. And when we start making shots, hopefully we can win by a bigger margin.”
North Carolina (22-4, 9-2 Atlantic Coast Conference) took a half-game lead over Duke and Florida State atop the league standings.
“It was one of those wins you have to have to have a fantastic year,” coach Roy Williams said. “It was a tough win, it was an ugly win in some ways. To be able to grit it out defensively — we did some better things there. That’s a huge benefit to win games when you play ugly.”
Miami (15-9, 6-5) lost to the Tar Heels for the 18th time in their 20 meetings, including two defeats this year.
Tags: Miami Hurricanes
