UNC depends on defense, overcomes historic low while winning ugly against Boston College

CHAPEL HILL — For all the numbers and statistical measures available to illustrate what North Carolina encountered in dispatching Boston College, senior swingman Leaky Black chose not to focus on the historically bumpy offense.

“That’s winning basketball to me,” he said of his team’s stout defensive effort Wednesday night, after the Tar Heels scratched out a 58-47 victory in Atlantic Coast Conference basketball at the Smith Center.

With its legs heavy, North Carolina won ugly, weathering the worst shooting performance during a victory in school history — 29.1 percent from the field — and producing the program’s lowest scoring total in a win in 11 years. The Tar Heels had lost their previous 22 games when they fell short of reaching the 60-point mark.

And yet Boston College proved more futile. The Eagles missed their final 10 shots from the field here, and went scoreless across the game’s concluding 7:13 to produce just 16 points in the second half. North Carolina led 50-47 when Boston College connected from the field for the last time, and coaxed the outcome to the finish line from there.

“It’s going to be games like that,” North Carolina guard Caleb Love said. “It’s the ACC, it’s conference play. We just had to grind it out and we got the win.”

Love’s 16 points topped the Tar Heels, who got 18 rebounds from Armando Bacot and 13 points from RJ Davis. Bacot’s struggles typified this slog of a night. North Carolina’s leading scorer went just 1-for-10 from the field and scored six points, ending his streak of 10 straight double-doubles.

Tar Heels coach Hubert Davis said “we found ways to be able to score in combination with getting stops when we needed to.” North Carolina made do despite converting just two field goals during the game’s final 8½ minutes — Love’s tough drive off the glass and Black’s flying put-back.

Dawson Garcia missed his second game in a row since returning home to Minnesota on Monday due to an illness in his family. The Tar Heels played their third game in five nights, and the toll showed as they managed to improve to 11-0 at home this season.

“Shots weren’t falling and it’s kind of weird, because that usually happens on the road,” Love said. “It’s not supposed to happen at home, but it happened. We’ve just got to put this game behind us.”

Quinten Post was the only player in double figures for Boston College (8-11, 3-6) with 10 points off the bench. The Eagles arrived off an 87-57 blasting suffered at Wake Forest on Monday night. They proceeded to shoot just 21.4 percent from the field during the second half against North Carolina, while stumbling to 1-for-16 from 3-point range for the game.

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After toughing out a victory against Virginia Tech in another grinder two nights earlier, North Carolina has shot just 39-for-118 from the field (33.1 percent) across its last two games, both at home.

But don’t count Black as overly concerned about those woes with North Carolina State next on the schedule. The rival Wolfpack visits Saturday afternoon to close the Tar Heels’ three-game homestand.

“We know what’s at stake this Saturday,” Black said, “and I feel like our guys are going to be ready, going to be locked in. I don’t want to jinx anything, but I highly doubt that we’ll shoot that low of a percentage.”

Here are more takeaways from Wednesday night in Chapel Hill:

Defenses aiming at Armando Bacot

Since starting a perfect 6-for-6 from the field against Virginia Tech on Monday night, the power forward Bacot has slipped into a 2-for-23 shooting funk.

His only bucket against Boston College came on a stick-back of his own miss a little more than four minutes into the game. He missed his final seven shots from the field. Much like the Hokies two nights prior, Boston College often sent double teams Bacot’s way, and worked to crowd him around the basket.

Bacot’s rebounding production has risen this month. He’s up to 12.1 boards per game on the season after Wednesday night’s hefty output, ranking him first in the ACC and third nationally. Hubert Davis has said since Bacot delivered 29-point games in beatdowns of Virginia (on Jan. 8) and Georgia Tech (on Jan. 15), opposing teams have geared their defenses toward corralling him to a greater degree.

“The attention to Armando has stepped up a number of levels,” Davis said Wednesday night. “And so it’s a combination of things. Armando being able to adjust to the heightened defensive effort of opposing teams not allowing him to catch the ball close to the basket and being able to get to his spots, and also for me to do a better job of calling different plays, different actions to try to get him the ball around the basket a little bit easier on the move.”

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Starters shouldering heavy load

The Tar Heels are navigating a demanding stretch of four games packed into eight days. And while Hubert Davis said he “felt like we were a little tired,” he again put heavy minutes on the team’s starters Wednesday night.

Black and Bacot played 38 minutes of the 40-minute game against Boston College. Love, RJ Davis and Brady Manek all logged more than 34 minutes.

North Carolina brought Kerwin Walton (11 minutes), Justin McKoy (six minutes) and Puff Johnson (five minutes) off the bench. The freshman pair of D’Marco Dunn and Dontrez Styles weren’t used against Virginia Tech or Boston College.

Black smiled and said “I feel great,” when asked how tired he felt afterward.

“It’s always good to get a rest,” Love said, “but if Coach needs me out there and he keeps me out there, I’ll stay out there however long he wants. I’ll play the whole game. It’s just all up to Coach’s decision and that’s his decision.”

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Adam Smith is a sports reporter for the Burlington Times-News and USA TODAY Network. You can reach him by email at asmith@thetimesnews.com or @adam_smithTN on Twitter.

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This article originally appeared on Times-News: UNC basketball depends on defense in ugly win over Boston College