No. 23 WBB Hosts No. 13 Louisville Sunday For Ranked Battle

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. – A battle of ranked women's basketball teams is set for Sunday afternoon at Carmichael Arena as No. 23 North Carolina hosts No. 13 Louisville. Tipoff is 2 p.m. and the game will air on ACC Network.

Tickets are available here. Students and staff with a UNC One Card get in free.

UNC comes into the game at 13-5 overall and 5-1 in ACC play following a 73-68 win at Georgia Tech on Thursday.

Louisville is 16-2 and undefeated in league play at 5-0 following a win Thursday at Clemson. The Cardinals sit atop the league standings as the only team without an ACC loss. UNC and Syracuse are tied for second at 5-1 in league play, with the Tar Heels having handed the Orange its only loss of the season.

This is the second time this year that Carmichael will host a battle of ranked teams. On Nov. 30, No. 24 UNC hosted top-ranked South Carolina in the inaugural ACC/SEC Challenge

Heels vs. Cards
The Cardinals and Tar Heels will meet Sunday for the 14th time in a series that dates back to the 1984-85 season. The Cardinals lead the series 9-4 and had won eight games in a row before UNC's victory in Chapel Hill in 2022.
• Last season in Louisville (Feb. 5, 2023), the Tar Heels saw an eight-game winning streak end with a 62-55 loss to the Cardinals. Three UNC players hit double figures led by Deja Kelly with 13, seven of which came at the foul line. Paulina Paris scored 12 points and played 40 minutes for the first time in her career as only seven players saw action for the short-handed Tar Heels. Anya Poole added 10. Then-junior Alyssa Ustby had started 71 games in a row but did not make the trip because of a lower body injury. Starting guard Eva Hodgson was also out with injury.
The Tar Heels hit just one three-pointer and shot a season-low .083 (1-12) from three-point range.
• The last time the teams played in Chapel Hill (Feb. 17, 2022), UNC pulled out a 66-65 win over No. 3 Louisville in a back-and-forth game. Louisville got off two shots in the final seconds, a three pointer and a final prayer that hung on the rim – "it felt like an hour," UNC coach Courtney Banghart said – before falling away and launching the Tar Heel celebration.
The win made UNC 20-5 and put the Tar Heels at the 20-wins mark for the first time since the 2014-15 season.

Next up
UNC stays home for another game, hosting Miami Thursday for an 8 PM tipoff. Those are UNC's first back-to-back home games since hosting Clemson on Dec. 31 and Syracuse on Jan. 4. Carolina won't play back-to-back home games again in the regular season.

Trending
• Senior guard Deja Kelly has totaled 77 points over the past three outings, with 23 points at FSU on Jan. 11, a season-high 27 against Virginia last Sunday, and 27 again on Thursday at Georgia Tech. She's averaging 25.7 points over that span, 17.5 in ACC play and 16.1 for the season. It's the first time in her career she's scored 20+ in three consecutive games.

• UNC is 2-4 this season against ranked teams. Carolina has losses to No. 1 South Carolina (H), No. 11 Kansas State (N), No. 12 UConn (N, trending H), and No. 21 FSU (A), and wins over No. 25 Syracuse (H) and No. 16 Notre Dame (A).
• Six players on the roster have at least one 20-point game in a Carolina uniform. Deja Kelly has hit 20 points on 27 occasions (six this season, including the past three games in a row), Alyssa Ustby seven (two this year), and Lexi Donarski and Maria Gakdeng two each. Paulina Paris and Kayla McPherson have reached 20 points once each, both during the 2022-23 season.
• UNC outrebounded Notre Dame 47-41 to win the rebounding battle for the first time in ACC play. The Tar Heels followed that up with a 48-47 advantage at FSU, a 44-39 advantage over UVa and then a 32-30 margin over Georgia Tech. UNC holds a +1.8 rebounding advantage in ACC play.

Stats Notes
• Deja Kelly leads the ACC and ranks fifth in the nation in free throw attempts with 114. She is 17-20 from the line over the last two games (7-8 vs UVa, 10-12 vs Ga Tech).
• Maria Gakdeng is shooting .655 from the field, a percentage that would comfortably lead the ACC if she had the required five makes per game to be ranked. (She has 4.1.)
• Against No. 25 Syracuse, Alyssa Ustby became the first player in Division I history to register 15 points, 15 rebounds and 10 assists against an AP-ranked opponent. (ESPN Stats and Info)
• Against Virginia, Deja Kelly became the first Tar Heel since at least 2009, the furthest back the stats track, with 25 points, 5 rebounds, 5 assists and only 1 turnover. (HerHoopStats)
Milestone Watch
• Deja Kelly passed the 1,500 career points mark in the Dec. 19 win over Oklahoma, becoming the 25th Tar Heel to reach that milestone. She currently has 1,608 career points, 19th in program history.
• After Anya Poole played in her 100th career game last Sunday, the Tar Heels have four players on the roster with 100 or more career games. (Deja Kelly, Lexi Donarski, Alyssa Ustby and Poole.)
• Carolina's 84.2 free throw percentage is a season high and the team's best since shooting 87.5 percent against St. John's in the first round of the NCAA Tournament on Mar. 18, 2023. It's the best free throw percentage for the Tar Heels with at least 15 makes since going 18-for-19 (94.7%) at Pitt on Jan. 26, 2023.

ACC Action Notables
Six games into the ACC schedule, Tar Heels have put up impressive numbers:
• Until her four at Georgia Tech, Alyssa Ustby had grabbed at least nine boards in every conference game. She led the league with 11.8 rebounds per game in ACC play heading into Thursday's game in Atlanta. She's now in third with 10.5 per game against conference foes.
• Lexi Donarski was 13-29 from three-point range through the first three games of the ACC season, including six in the ACC opener against Clemson. She's cooled off since then to go 2-13 in the last three games but is still shooting .357 from three in conference play, a percentage that ranks third in the league. Her 2.5 makes per game also ranks her third.
• Deja Kelly ranks third in the ACC in assist-turnover ratio at 1.92. Her 4.2 assists per game are eighth in the league. She matched her career high with eight assists against Clemson.

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Players Mentioned

Lexi Donarski

Maria Gakdeng

Eva Hodgson

Deja Kelly

Kayla McPherson

Paulina Paris

Anya Poole

Alyssa Ustby

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University of North Carolina Athletics