Is this the real year from which to judge HD as a coach and the success (or lack) that he has going forward. He has the players he wants (for the most part), he has one "elite" recruit with two top 10 players coming, so the talent seems to be on an upward trajectory. Last two years he was dealing with the same team/issues that Roy had his last couple of years. Getting a FF out of that (and beating Dook in the last two games) was miraculous.

My guess would be up to 7th and your guess would be?

For those in the know regarding the women’s hoops team, any rumblings on whether or not Deja Kelly is planning to use her Covid year?

Seems like a domino that could have quite an impact on next seasons men’s team.

Who are your starters on this list of UNC's ACC POY winners? Listed in chronological order, most recent first.

Guys in bold were also national POY winners.

Justin Jackson
Tyler Zeller
Tywon Lawson
Tyler Hansbrough
Joseph Forte
Antawn Jamison
Michael Jordan
Phil Ford
Mitch Kupchak
Larry Miller
Billy Cunningham
Lee Shaffer
Pete Brennan
Lennie Rosenbluth

Best rivalry ever?

UNC. Duke. Tickets dropping Wednesday 03.06 only in the Autograph app

There will be 4 ticket packages; each ticket package is $32 and includes 2 tickets in Section 3 Row O + Section 2 Row N. Full drop details in the Autograph app.

· Referral Code: THI
· Referral link: https://link.ag.fan/thi

I know that it wasn’t perfect, but I’m elated with the win today. Yes, Hubert needs to stop playing stall ball with 4 minutes left in the game and I think that he will correct that before the end of the year. State was unconscious shooting in the 1st half and we weathered the storm.

We were +17 in the 2nd half against a rival with a coach who is fighting for his job. We made the correct adjustments and our boys made winning plays. Super proud of this team!

Discussion
The Wolfpack came to the Dean Dome and put on a show in the 2nd quarter of the game. After halftime it was the Heels' game, as they emerged a 9-point winner.

UNC scored an excellent 1.08 points per possession on 47% FG shooting, 38% 3-point shooting, and outstanding FT shooting on many attempts.

Defensively it was not a good day. At halftime NCSU had scored 1.32 points per possession, but was just awful in the 3rd quarter of the game, going on a 12-shot drought at one point. They ended up scoring 0.91 points per possession, so for the second half they must have been somewhere in the 0.50 pts per possession range.
It wans't a historic game in any facet, but UNC was unusually good at the FT line, NCSU was unusually good from 3, and the game was exceptionally slow, with only 150 possessions.

Next up on Tuesday the Heels welcome a hot Notre Dame team that just put Clemson and UVA on the bubble this week.

CAROLINA 79, NC STATE 70
MARCH 2, 2024
ROY WILLIAMS COURT AT THE DEAN E. SMITH CENTER
CHAPEL HILL

UNC Scoring Leader: Harrison Ingram 22
UNC Rebound Leader: Armando Bacot, RJ Davis 7
UNC Assist Leader: Elliot Cadeau 7
Team Records: Carolina 23-6, 15-3 ACC; NC State 17-112, 9-9 ACC

• The Tar Heels outscored the Wolfpack, 42-25 (+17) in the second half.
• It was UNC’s largest second-half scoring margin since the Tar Heels outscored Wake Forest by 22 on Jan. 22.
• Carolina overcame an eight-point halftime deficit. It was the largest halftime deficit in a win this season (previous was six vs. Northern Iowa in November and Florida State on Dec. 2, and the largest since overcoming an eight-point halftime deficit at Notre Dame on 2/22/2023).
• Carolina trailed, 45-37, at the half. It was UNC’s largest deficit at the half since Feb. 6 vs. Clemson, when the Tigers led by nine.
• Carolina overcame its largest halftime deficit to win in the Smith Center since beating Florida State, which led by 12 at half on 2/27/2021.

• UNC trailed at halftime for the 10th time this season. The Tar Heels are 7-3 when facing a halftime deficit.
• NC State shot 57.6% from the floor and made 7 of 11 3FGs in scoring 45 first-half points, the most in a first half by an opponent his season (UConn scored 44 on Dec. 5).
• In the second half, Carolina held the Pack to 22.2% from the floor (lowest by any opponent in the second half this season), including 2 of 8 from three.
• NC State missed 15 consecutive field goals in the second half. The Wolfpack is the first opponent to miss 15 consecutive field goals since Pittsburgh on 1/5/19.
• It was the seventh time the Tar Heels held an opponent below 30% in a half this season (three of the seven by NC State).

• In the first half, NC State scored 13 points off UNC turnovers. In the second half, the Tar Heels turned the ball over just three times that led to two points. Conversely, UNC scored 10 its 12 second-half points in the second half.
• UNC shot 47.2% from the floor. UNC is 12-2 when shooting better than 45% this season.
• Carolina made 23 free throws, its most since making 25 against Florida State on 12/2/23.
• UNC is 9-1 this season when it makes 20 or more free throws and 10-1 when it converts 80% or better from the line.
• Carolina shot 85.2% from the free throw line, its best percentage since shooting 86.4% at Pittsburgh on 1/2/24. It was the fourth time this season UNC has shot at least 85% from the free throw line.

• Carolina outrebounded NC State, 34-31. UNC has outrebounded 18 consecutive opponents, its longest streak since outrebounding 26 consecutive opponents in 2007-08. The Tar Heels are 15-3 in those 18 games.
• Elliot Cadeau (15 points) scored in double figures for the seventh time this season. UNC is 7-0 in those games.
• Cadeau had a game-high seven assists, the fifth time in the last six games he had five or more assists. Carolina is 9-4 when Cadeau has five or more assists.
• Harrison Ingram scored a season-high 22 points (previous high was 21 vs. Duke). Ingram scored 20 or more points for the fifth time this season and seventh time in his career.
• Ingram and Cadeau both scored more points in the first half than either had scored in the previous two games.

• Armando Bacot scored 13 points, the 120th time he scored in double figures in his career.
• Bacot (2,216 points) passed Wake Forest’s Randolph Childress for 18th on the all-time ACC scoring list.
• Bacot made four field goals and passed Al Wood for the third-most field goals in UNC history. Bacot has 826 one more than Wood.
• Bacot played in his 161st game, tying Virginia’s Kihei Clark for most games played in ACC history.
• RJ Davis scored 14 points, scoring in double figures for the 26th consecutive game and 28th time this season.

• Davis’ double-figure scoring streak is the longest by a Tar Heel since Bacot scored in double figures in 28 consecutive games (last 13 of 2021-22 and the first 15 of 2022-23).
• Davis has 1,926 points. He passed Brad Daugherty (1,912) for 10th all-time in scoring at UNC.
• Davis had five assists, including the 400th of his career.
• Davis is the only Tar Heel with at least 1,900 career points, 500 rebounds, 400 assists, 250 three-pointers and 100 steals.
• Davis is the 18th Tar Heel with 400 assists, the first since Joel Berry II and Theo Pinson, who played from 2014-18.

• Davis had five assists. UNC is 7-1 this year and 26-5 overall when Davis has five or more assists.
• Bacot and Davis led UNC with seven rebounds. It was the second time this season and fourth time in his career Davis led the Tar Heels in rebounds. It was the 114th time Bacot led UNC in rebounds.

UNC-NC State
• Carolina is 166-80 vs. the Wolfpack. The 166 wins are the most against any opponent.
• Carolina is 82-23 vs. NC State in Chapel Hill, including 31-7 in the Smith Center.
• The Tar Heels have won six in a row in the Smith Center.
• UNC is 38-6 in the last 44 games vs. NC State and 55-13 over the last 32 seasons.

Next Game: vs. Notre Dame, Tuesday, March 5 (7 p.m., ACC Network)

I acquired all of the Division I team data since 2002, and from that we can observe some fascinating trends and data relationships in the data. This is a multipart series exploring some of that data.

The NCAA's data doesn't report Offensive Rebounding from before 2015, but I was able to find it at TeamRankings.com. They also post the opponent figures. From this, we can see the trend of Offensive Rebounding allowed by teams.



The graph shows the Offensive Rebounding Percentage Allowed (or%), or "Defensive Rebounding Percentage", for the last 23 seasons, through the morning of March 2, 2024. The grey line shows the or% for all of Division I, while the green line shows the or% for teams that made the NCAA tournament that year.

Over the last two decades we have seen this figures fall by about 5 percentage points or so. This trend needs further investigation.

The national and tournament figures average have remained aligned with each other, so the impact this stat has on making the tournament is miniscule.

UNC, shown in blue, has had significantly lower or% than the national and tournament averages since 2017. This, too, is something that needs further investigation.

How important is this statistic? Despite everyone's affinity for rebounding, its correlation factor with Winning Percentage is only 0.273, almost exactly what it is for OR%. This, again, is a decent metric to use for team success, but it is among many like it in usefulness.

Next up: Points Per Possession (Smith and Modern)