1. Disappointing home loss for Carolina, as the Heels fall 78-70 to Georgia.
2. Georgia has been an NCAA Tournament team the last two years, but the Heels had a three-point lead with five minutes remaining and an open three-pointer to make it a six-point lead that they blew. From that point on, they finished 3 of 11 from the field as Georgia scored or grabbed the offensive rebound on almost every trip.
3. Carolina’s rebounding issues were a problem in the final three minutes. Georgia got a key basket and two free throws on second chance opportunities. The visitors had 15 second-chance points off their 18 offensive rebounds and won the overall rebounding battle, 52-43. The Dawgs had 13 second chance points in the second half.
4. The Heels need to find a way to score when three-pointers aren’t falling. They downed 38, a school record, Friday. Granted, part of that was because they were behind and had to take some more late, but a lot of it came while the game was still in the balance. To make matters even worse, they only made nine. That’s not to say they shot effectively in other areas of the court, as they also made just 15 of 35 from two-point range. For the game, they shot 32.9 percent overall and 23.7 percent from three.
5. In reality, the only reliable offense was getting to the free throw line, where they were 13 of 19 but only 5 of 7 in the second half. Sayon Keïta, Alex Samodorov And Jarin Stevenson combined to make a free throw.
6. Terrence Brown helped keep UNC in the game in the second half. He’s shown a variety of ways to score during his young career at UNC, and much of his offense Friday came from the three-point line, where he scored four. No matter what he does from the perimeter, he’s always a threat to get to the basket and make contact. He finished with a team-high 21 points and committed a team-high five fouls. Unfortunately, he failed to shoot in the final 5:17.
7. Michael Malone juggled his lineup in the final minutes and used a freshman Maxime Adams instead of Stevenson. The Chapel Hill native struggled in the first four games of the season (he was 2 of 7 and 0 of 3 against Georgia but grabbed seven rebounds) but Carolina will need him if it wants to get where it wants to go this year. Adams continues to be Carolina’s leading rebounder, as he had 11 even while shooting 1-of-8.
8. Malone is going to be frustrated with Carolina’s conversions around the rim. The Heels missed several chances to finish.
9. Georgia’s 9-0 run to close the first half capped a frustrating 20 minutes. The Tar Heels shot 9 of 36 from the field, including 5 of 20 from three. The 25 percent mark from the field tied the third-worst mark for a half in Smith Center history, which now spans 601 games.
10. Georgia came into the game having taken care of their basketball very well, starting the season 3-0. But the Heels forced errors on the Bulldogs’ first three possessions of the game and it proved to be one of Carolina’s best methods of generating offense in the first half. The Heels got seven points off eight Georgia turnovers in the opening stanza and finished with 12 points off 12 Georgia turnovers, and some of those transition opportunities helped build a nine-point lead with 10:35 to play. However, the Heels failed to get a turnover in the final 9:38 of the game.
11. Surprisingly, this was Carolina’s first meeting against Georgia since November 1998. You won’t have to wait that long for the rematch, as the two teams are scheduled to meet in Athens in November or December 2028.
12. The loss ended a 21-game winning streak at the Smith Center. The Heels have a week off until they return to the Smith Center next Friday night against Marshall, after which they will play two home games in four days (Nov. 20 against the Herd and a quick turnaround to face King Rice and Monmouth on Nov. 23).
Gn sports
