Tar Heels shake up starting lineup, beat Boston College 79-68

CHESTNUT HILL, MASS. — J.P. Tokoto has a tattoo on the left side of his chest. It reads, “Strength is not measured by a physical capacity; it’s measured by an indomitable will.”

Is J.P. Tokoto strong? His physical gifts — a long and lean frame, otherworldly athleticism — make him the Tar Heels’ best perimeter defender and slasher. But sometimes his drive, Coach Roy Williams says …

“J.P. seemed out of it the other night, completely,” Williams said after No. 12 North Carolina’s 79-68 win against Boston College on Saturday at the Conte Forum, referring to Tokoto’s one-point, one-rebound performance in UNC’s dispiriting loss to Virginia on Monday night.

Entering Saturday, Tokoto, a 6-foot-6 junior forward, had started 21 of UNC’s 23 games this season. Sophomore forward Kennedy Meeks, who averages nearly 13 points and eight rebounds a game, had started 22. Neither started on Saturday.

“You lose two in a row” — first to Louisville last Saturday, then to UVa. — “you can’t say everything’s rosy,” Williams said. “I wasn’t ready to jump off a building, I wasn’t ready to panic, but you gotta try something different.

“I hesitated a little bit to make any change, but I wasn’t just gonna make one change,” he continued. “If you make one change, everyone thinks you’re pointing at him. And that’s not what it was.”

So what was it, Coach? “We hadn’t played well,” he said, simply, so he altered his starting five against Boston College (9-13, 1-9 ACC): Exit Tokoto and Meeks, enter guard Nate Britt and forward Isaiah Hicks.

Williams’ change bore victorious fruit — Hicks had a career-high 21 points and 28 minutes against the small-ball-minded Eagles, in a win that snapped the Tar Heels’ first losing streak of the season — but maybe more importantly revived his uber-athletic swingman.

“It’s a shake-up. It’s a wake-up call,” Tokoto said after the game. “It’s coach telling…” He paused. “Everybody — not just the guys that got kicked out of the lineup or put in the lineup. He’s telling everybody that we need to step up our play.”

In the first half, though, Williams’ admonitions seemed ignored. The Tar Heels (18-6, 8-3) were sloppy, turning the ball over three times within the first three minutes, including two backcourt violations, and shot poorly. Boston College guard Olivier Hanlan, whom Williams praised heavily after the game, got what he wanted, when he wanted, and finished the half with 15 points.

Then UNC started pounding inside: to Hicks, to Brice Johnson, to Meeks. The difference in size and strength was stark, and the Tar Heels exploited it, scoring more than 58 percent of their points in the paint, with soft jump hooks, easy lay-ups, booming dunks. In the second half, with guards Britt and Marcus Paige saddled by fouls, Tokoto switched onto Hanlan on defense. The slippery guard was burdened by Tokoto’s length and speed.

“J.P. kind of set the tone for us defensively,” said Paige, who had 13 points, all in the second half. “When one man leads, a lot of times everyone follows. He did a great job of being a pest on defense and making it hard on Hanlan to get his looks.”

After the Eagles started a too-little, too-late comeback late in the second half, UNC iced the win with free throws. After the game, Tokoto was happy.

“My mentality was, ‘When I do get in, be positive, give the team energy, come in and guard whoever needs to be guarded, make easy plays, attack the rim,’” he said. He did all of those things, he said, in a non-starting role. Our question, then, is answered: J.P. Tokoto is strong. J.P. Tokoto is awake.