Joel Berry comes into his own at Georgia Tech

ATLANTA — Sometimes the biggest things come in the smallest packages.

Sometimes it appears as points, the byproduct of confidence oozing from the stitches of a jersey. Other times it’s assists, or blocks, or any number of minute statistics that fail to capture the scope of a moment. Perhaps it’s something different entirely, something like standing up in the wake of humiliation.

Tuesday night, during the North Carolina men’s basketball team’s 81-49 demolition of Georgia Tech, it was all three from one player — Joel Berry.

“We got some good help in the first half — pretty good run there — with Joel off the bench, making his threes,” Coach Roy Williams said. “I think that was big for us.”

And so it was, one of the smallest of players making the largest of contributions. With 8:09 left in the first half of Tuesday’s romp, the six-foot freshman had tied his career-high with eight points. By halftime, Berry had bested his previous milestone to the tune of 11 points on 4-of-5 shooting.

But Berry was doing it like few of his teammates have proven capable of: He was knocking down 3-pointers.

“I want to be able to make shots because I know I can shoot and the coaching staff knows I can shoot,” Berry said. “I’ve been just trying to put up extra shots and you know, hopefully it’ll pay off in a game.

“Today it did.”

So far this season that hasn’t been the case. After arriving in Chapel Hill as the No. 17 player in the 2014 ESPN 100, Berry had struggled to make much of an impact from behind the arc. Before Tuesday’s game, the freshman guard had only made eight 3-pointers all season.

He made three against the Yellow Jackets alone.

But Berry’s contributions went beyond making baskets.

He helped with his handles, dribbling the length of the court against countless Georgia Tech double-teams. He assisted, emotionally and literally, with hook passes and lobs. He even helped block a shot midway through the second half, swatting the ball into the arms of yellow-and-blue-clad onlookers.

“All freshman point guards talk about the struggle of learning everything — well, it’s late in the year now, he’s comfortable with our offense,” said junior guard Marcus Paige. “He’s got his body back feeling good, so he can be the Joel Berry we want him to be.”

For the majority of Tuesday’s contest, Berry was — but nobody’s perfect.

He telegraphed a pass to a Georgia Tech defender for the steal and subsequent layup. He drifted on defense, just far enough for players to rise up and make shots. He even got juked, falling backwards while trying to guard a crossover.

But none of those instances defined his night — no post game questions arose on the nature of his mistakes. Instead they were all positive, cautiously optimistic of a yet-untapped potential finally being breached.

“I’ve been saying for the last couple of weeks he’s been playing a lot better, and now it’s super obvious,” Paige said. “He had 15 points tonight, but he was aggressive, he took care of the ball, he made plays.

“It wasn’t just the scoring.”

It was a conglomeration of things — buckets, assists, standing up after an embarrassing fall. Any one of them would have been impressive, but together, they held more significance.

They proved, at the crux of the season, that the little guy can come up big.

sports@dailytarheel.com