Slideshow: UNC continues to the Final Four CHARLOTTE - They won fast, and they won slow. They won big, and they won close. They won pretty, and they won ugly. Now the Tar Heels are going to the Final Four to see if they can win some more. Out to avenge last year's run that ended in the Elite Eight, North Carolina did just that, holding off Louisville 83-73 on Saturday at Charlotte Bobcats Arena.
SATURDAY -- CHARLOTTE - Tyler Hansbrough has already been named national player of the year, ACC player of the year and he'll have his jersey retired at the end of his North Carolina career. Against Louisville, that didn't matter. The newfound Hansbrough title that mattered was this: clutch jump shooter. Hansbrough stroked two key jump shots in the game's final minutes to preserve a tense North Carolina lead and pave the way to a 83-73 victory against Louisville, punching UNC's ticket to the Final Four next weekend in San Antonio.
CHARLOTTE - Even the NCAA Tournament's top overall seed can play a little nervously sometimes. Only four days after walloping Arkansas, the Tar Heels were slow to regain the powerful form they had in Raleigh during their game against Washington State on Thursday. Once they did, though, they looked like the regular Tar Heels - and they didn't look back in blowing by the Cougars. "A lot of that (hesitance) is the NCAA Tournament, kids wanting to do so well that they pressure themselves," UNC coach Roy Williams said.
Basketball theorists often strategize, trying to predict how a team's past games can bode for its future. Roy Williams is not one of those theorists. "I don't get caught up in how well we played today and how that relates to how we'll play next weekend," Williams said. He was asked after North Carolina's 108-77 blowout of Arkansas on Sunday if he wished the team's weekend games had been closer, so that his Tar Heels were put up to face a tougher test. "It's good enough for me," Williams said. "I'm a little old-fashioned, old school, whatever, and you have to play today.
RALEIGH - Roy Williams challenged Deon Thompson and Alex Stepheson a week ago, telling them they needed to step up their performances alongside Tyler Hansbrough in the post. Sunday they responded with perfection. The pair combined to make all 13 of their shots and accounted for 26 points in UNC's 108-77 rout of Arkansas, putting the finishing touches on an already potent Tar Heel rotation. "When Deon and Alex can shoot the way they did today, I think we're unstoppable," Wayne Ellington said. "When those guys step up and do that, we don't have any weak link here."
Check out another article on Friday's game at: http://media.www.dailytarheel.com/media/storage/paper885/news/2008/03/20/Sports/Tar-Heels.Fix.D.In.Second.Half-3278677.shtml RALEIGH -- North Carolina scored 60 points by halftime, ripped off six more in the first minute of the second half, and spent the rest of the game chasing its all-time NCAA scoring record of 123 points, set against Loyola Marymount in 1988.
As his North Carolina team learned their NCAA Tournament path Sunday, Roy Williams said he was repeatedly shocked. But he tempered that shock with a dose of relief that he isn't a member of the committee that sets the bracket. "They have no way of winning completely," Williams said at his news conference Monday. "It's too confusing. Anybody can stand up and make a case that sounds good. And the next person can get up and make a case that sounds good."
Ty Lawson could return to the court for the first time in seven games Saturday - it'll just happen about 700 miles away. Lawson practiced lightly Wednesday and Thursday and could be a go for minimal minutes in Chestnut Hill, Mass., against Boston College. "Ty yesterday in practice went up and down the court in three-on-zero and five-on-zero situations," coach Roy Williams said in his news conference Thursday. "Nothing where there was a defense. He did some shooting, and that was it."
With each win, North Carolina edges closer to the top ranking in the Associated Press poll, but UNC is already No. 1 in rebounding. fall. And it's not even close. The Tar Heels have proven themselves to be the most dominant team in the country on the boards, averaging 12 more rebounds than their opponents every game. Only twice this season have the Tar Heels been out-rebounded, and both came during Thanksgiving break's Las Vegas Invitational. Since then, UNC has won the battle for the boards in every single game - usually by double-digits.
RALEIGH - Roy Williams loves to win games with depth. His national championship team in 2005 regularly played nine and sometimes 10 players, giving the starters plenty of rest. Wednesday against N.C. State, Williams won using just the opposite. Despite employing essentially a six-man rotation, North Carolina was the fresher, more energetic team, and it showed during a second half that UNC dominated, stretching its lead to 20 points on multiple occasions.
