Column: Despite Sweet 16 loss, UNC women's basketball's season represents strides

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — It’s easy to turn the page once a season ends. 

And even if it's simple to move on, UNC women's basketball's season should serve as a reminder — it's another chapter for a program that's headed in the right direction, but it's just not there, yet. The Tar Heels are still in search of the defining wins to propel a title run. 

But there's still been growth. Five years ago, North Carolina sat at the bottom four of the ACC standings and had no chance of making the NCAA tournament. This year, UNC went 29-8, earning its best on-the-road record since 2006. 

Despite No. 3 seed North Carolina’s, 47-38, loss to No. 2 seed Duke in the Sweet 16, North Carolina is inching closer to the program it wants to become. UNC hosted the NCAA tournament for the first time in 10 years and won multiple ACC tournament games for the first time in 11 years. 

“You can't go to a national championship from never going to the Final Four, [or] from never going to the Sweet 16,” head coach Courtney Banghart said. “So going to two Sweet 16s in four years, there is a culture now. There is an expectation.”

Banghart led UNC to its best season with her at the helm, since taking over in 2019. 

The Tar Heels won 12 of their 13 non-conference games, with the only defeat at the hands of powerhouse UConn early in the season. UNC then won 12 of its first 15 ACC games before falling in its final two conference matchups with an injured starting lineup. 

North Carolina won its first two games in the ACC tournament before falling to top-seeded N.C. State. The Tar Heels dominated their first two NCAA tournament opponents, before posting a season-low point total against Duke. 

Although it marked bests for the first time in decades, the results didn't lead to any banners. UNC hasn't gotten over the hump, yet.

The Tar Heels were knocked out of the ACC tournament with their worst shooting performance of the season at 27.9 percent. North Carolina shot below 30 percent once again against Duke on Friday — a team UNC had beaten in overtime in January, then lost to in February — to end its season. 

North Carolina reached the Sweet 16 in 2022 for the first time since 2015. But that year, fifth-seeded UNC fell, 69-61, to top-seeded South Carolina. Poor shooting dug the Tar Heels into an 11-point hole they were ultimately unable to crawl out of, even with a comeback that brought the score within four points in the final four minutes. 

A similar story played out on Friday.

“I'm feeling gratitude for time well spent with that senior group, all five of them, but I'm also having to navigate that wasn't quite enough,” Banghart said. “And that's the hard thing.” 

The program plans on continuing the momentum to inch closer to becoming a contender in March. 

“[This season] was very successful in a lot of different ways," first-year guard Lanie Grant said. "The next step for us is learning from these losses and these tournaments and continuing to pursue farther runs and Elite Eights, Final Fours. The good thing is we know what it takes to get here and we know what it feels like.” 

Experience is only useful if North Carolina can learn from it. The responsibility to continue UNC’s recent uptick in wins will fall on the shoulders of returning leadership. 

And with three Tar Heel starters graduating — Lexi Donarski, Alyssa Ustby and Maria Gakdeng — junior Indya Nivar will have to lead the new cohort. 

“[I’ll] try to exemplify what they’ve done this year,” Nivar said, speaking about her leadership next season. “But also twist it in my own ways so that it caters to the team because it’s going to be totally different.”

Sure, the sting of posting a 15-of-53 shooting performance in the Sweet 16 will hurt, but it won’t outlast the momentum UNC has built recently. Carmichael Arena has reported its highest fan attendance in the last two seasons in nearly a decade. 

And that excitement will only grow with North Carolina inking its best recruiting class next year under Banghart and the fourth-best in the nation per ESPN. 

Every team in college basketball has to turn the page eventually. But folding the corner on this one might help the Tar Heels discover something special a few chapters later. 

@cadeshoemaker23

@dthsports | sports@dailytarheel.com