MBB Welcomes Yellow Jackets To Smith Center Saturday

Saturday, December 10

Chapel Hill

3:15 PM

North Carolina

Georgia Tech

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Caleb Love

Photo by: Maggie Hobson

December 8, 2022 | Men's Basketball

Watch UNC Notes Live Stats Media Central Hubert Davis Press Conference Quotes

GAME 10: GEORGIA TECH
• Carolina returns to the Dean E. Smith Center for the first time in nearly three weeks when the Tar Heels play host to Georgia Tech on Saturday, Dec. 10.
• Tip time is 3:15 p.m. on ESPN.
• The Tar Heels are 5-4. UNC won its first five games but lost the last four, including two games in the Phil Knight Invitational and road games at Indiana and Virginia Tech.
• Georgia Tech is 6-3 and is playing its first ACC game of the season. The Yellow Jackets have won two in a row, including a 79-77 win over Georgia on December 6.
• Carolina began ACC play last Sunday in Blacksburg, Va., with an 80-72 loss to the Hokies. The Tar Heels were minus senior forward/center Armando Bacot and sophomore guard D'Marco Dunn.
• Bacot suffered a right shoulder contusion in the first half of the loss at Indiana on November 30, while Dunn broke a bone in his left hand in practice the afternoon before the game at Virginia Tech. Dunn is out for several weeks.
• Carolina's most recent win was an 89-81 triumph over Portland on Thanksgiving morning in the opening round of the Phil Knight Invitational in Portland, Ore.
• Carolina has lost four straight games for the first time since it dropped seven straight ACC games in February 2020.

STRENGTH OF SCHEDULE
• Carolina has played the 16th-most difficult schedule in the nation (per KenPom) among all teams and the third-most difficult among Power 5 conference teams.
• As of December 8 it has been the third-most difficult slate of games among teams in the Power 5 conferences behind only Michigan State and Oregon.
• The four teams that have defeated UNC (Iowa State, Alabama, Indiana and Virginia Tech) were a combined 31-4 through December 5.
• Carolina has three non-conference games left in the regular season – a home game vs. The Citadel on December 13, the CBS Sports Classic in New York vs. Ohio State on December 17 and the Jumpman Invitational in Charlotte vs. Michigan on December 21.

ACC HOME OPENER
• This is the 70th season of Atlantic Coast Conference basketball.
• The Tar Heels have won 32 regular-season ACC championships and 18 ACC Tournament championships.
• Carolina is 730-302 in regular-season ACC play. The 730 wins are the most in ACC history.
• The Tar Heels are 233-65 all-time in the Smith Center in ACC play.
• UNC has won its last three ACC home openers, including last season over Virginia, which came after three straight road games to begin conference play.

UNC-GEORGIA TECH
• Carolina is 71-27 against Georgia Tech, including 31-6 in Chapel Hill.
• The Tar Heels are 26-5 vs. the Yellow Jackets in the Smith Center. That includes an 88-65 win on 1/15/22, the last time these teams played.
• UNC has won two in a row (both last season) and 11 of the last 14 games against Georgia Tech.
• UNC has won 18 of the last 20 games played in the Smith Center (except 2010 and 2020).

LAST SEASON VS. GEORGIA TECH
DEC. 5, 2021: UNC 79, @GEORGIA TECH 62
• Hubert Davis won his ACC debut on the road.
• The win was No. 2,300 in UNC history. Carolina joined Kentucky and Kansas as the only programs with 2,300 wins.
• Carolina shot 54.6% from the floor (65.5% in the second half), 58.8% from three and had 21 assists.
• RJ Davis led UNC with 23 points.
• Davis and Caleb Love combined for 40 points, 10 assists, four turnovers and four steals.
• Armando Bacot had 15 points and 13 rebounds.
• Carolina was 10 of 17 (.588) on three-pointers, including 7 of 9 in the second half. Brady Manek made three 3FGs in the second half.
• UNC went on a 22-4 run after trailing for the final time, 39-38, early in the second half.

JAN. 15, 2022: @UNC 88, GEORGIA TECH 65
• Bacot was 9 for 9 from the free throw line, scored 20 second-half points and tied his career high with 29 points. He became the first Tar Heel with 29 or more points in consecutive games since Tyler Hansbrough in 2007-08.
• Davis added 21 points.
• Leaky Black helped limit Michael Devoe, the ACC's leading scorer, to two points on 1 for 5 shooting with no assists and six turnovers. Black also had four assists.

NOTABLES
• Carolina's non-starters out-scored Virginia Tech's bench, 16-12, led by Tyler Nickel's eight points and six from Seth Trimble. It was the first time this season the UNC bench out-scored an opponent.
• Some notable stats according to KenPom. The Tar Heels are 10th in the country in offensive efficiency (114.7 points per 100 possessions), 13th best in getting to the free throw line (and 12th in percentage of points coming from the free throw line) and have committed the 27th- fewest turnovers per possession.
• Conversely, the Tar Heels are 311th in three-point percentage, 310th in forcing turnovers and 349th in assists to field goals.
• Some other notable stats in the Tar Heels' four-game losing streak: Carolina is shooting 41.4% from the floor, including 23.7% from three; the opponents have made nearly twice as many threes (35 to 18 or 8.8 per game to 4.5 per game); the opponents are out-rebounding UNC by 3.0 per game; the Tar Heels are averaging 7.3 fewer assists per game than their opponents; and UNC has 38 assists on 104 field goals (assists on 36.5% of their field goals).
• The Georgia Tech game is one of only two home games in December for the Tar Heels. Last year, UNC was home four times in December. Two seasons ago, due to the scheduling related to the pandemic, the Tar Heels played at home just once in December.
• Carolina's 103-101 loss, to Alabama was just the second four-overtime game in UNC history and the first since Carolina beat Tulane, 113-106, in New Orleans on Feb. 14, 1976.
• Carolina had not played even a triple overtime game since 2003-04 (a 119-114 loss to Wake Forest).
• It was only the third time UNC lost in 211 games all-time when scoring 100 points.
• Caleb Love played 57:24 in Carolina's four-overtime loss to Alabama. That is the second-highest minutes played in a game by a Tar Heel. Phil Ford played 58 minutes in a four-OT win at Tulane in 1976.
• Love was named to the PKI All-Tournament team after scoring a career-high 34 points against the Tide.
• Carolina is unranked in this week's AP poll. The Tar Heels were not ranked in the final poll that came out prior to the start of the 2022 NCAA Tournament.
• The Nov. 21 poll was the 113th time UNC was ranked No. 1 in an AP poll, fourth most in NCAA college basketball history.
• This was the 10th time the Tar Heels have been ranked No. 1 to begin a season (1977-78, 1981-82, 1983-84, 1986-87, 1993-94, 2007-08, 2008-09, 2011-12, 2015-16 and 2022-23).
• UNC's 10 preseason No. 1 rankings are the most all-time, breaking a tie with Duke. UCLA is third with eight, Kentucky is fourth with six and Arizona, Indiana, Kansas and Michigan are tied with three.

IN THE RECORD BOOK
• Carolina has an NCAA-record 80 1,000-point scorers, including Love and Armando Bacot, who scored his 1,000th point on 1/29/22.
• RJ Davis needs 89 points for 1,000.
• Love scored his 1,000th point in his 73rd game, the fewest games needed since Harrison Barnes hit the mark in his 61st game as a Tar Heel. Love was the 12th Tar Heel to score 1,000 since Barnes got there in 2012.
• Bacot set UNC single-season records last year with 511 rebounds, 31 double-doubles, five 20-rebound games (tied), 32 games with 10 or more rebounds, rebounds in an NCAA Tournament and rebounds by a Tar Heel in the Elite 8, national semifinal and national championship games.
• Bacot became the first player in NCAA Tournament history with six double-doubles in one year and tied the NCAA single-season record for double-doubles with 31 (Navy's David Robinson also had 31 in 1985-86).
• Bacot grabbed a career-high 23 rebounds in UNC's 80-64 win over previously unbeaten James Madison. Bacot's 23 rebounds (and Leaky Black's career-high 12 boards) helped the Tar Heels out-rebound the Dukes, 50-34, on Nov. 20.
• Bacot's 23 rebounds marked his sixth career game with 20 or more and 18th with 15 or more.
• Bacot had 10 rebounds at Indiana, his 60th game with 10 or more. Hall of Famer Billy Cunningham is the only Tar Heel with more games with 10 or more rebounds – Cunningham accomplished that 61 times.
• Bacot is second in UNC history in double-doubles (53), second in offensive rebounds per game (3.50), fourth in rebounds (1,090) and sixth in rebounds per game (10.1). The Richmond, Va., native is one of eight Tar Heels to average a career double-double (13.2/10.1).
• Sean May and Bacot are the only Tar Heels to average a double-double over a career in the last 50 seasons.
• Bacot needs eight rebounds to pass George Lynch for third all-time at UNC.
• Leaky Black has played in 131 games in four-plus seasons. He could break Deon Thompson's school record for games played (152).
• Black is one of two Tar Heels to start at least 100 career games. Bacot has made 107 starts and Black has 106.
• RJ Davis is fifth at UNC in free throw percentage.

MILLER, WILLIAMS INDUCTED INTO COLLEGE HALL
• Larry Miller, the only Tar Heel to twice earn ACC Player of the Year and ACC Tournament MVP honors, and three-time national championship winning head coach Roy Williams were inducted in the NABC College Basketball Hall of Fame Nov. 20 in Kansas City.
• Miller and Williams are among 13 Tar Heels in the College Basketball Hall of Fame with Larry Brown, Ben Carnevale, Billy Cunningham, Phil Ford, Antawn Jamison, Bob McAdoo, Frank McGuire, Sam Perkins, Charlie Scott, Dean Smith and James Worthy.
• In September, George Karl was inducted in the Naismith Hall of Fame. Karl, who played at UNC from 1970-73, became the 12th Tar Heel enshrined in Springfield with Brown, Carnevale, Cunningham, Bobby Jones, Michael Jordan, McAdoo, McGuire, Scott, Smith, Williams and James Worthy.

NOVEMBER SIGNEES
• Carolina signed two players to National Letters of Intent in November 2022.
• Zayden High, a 6-10 forward from San Antonio, Texas. High attends AZ Compass Prep in Chandler, Ariz., where he plays for Coach Ed Gipson.
• Simeon Wilcher, a 6-5 guard from Plainfield, N.J. Wilcher plays for Coach Dave Boff at Roselle Catholic High School in Roselle, N.J.