CHAPEL HILL — For all of the flawed aspects of North Carolina’s postseason résumé, the one deficiency that hadn’t posed an issue was a loss to a poorly rated opponent.
Until Wednesday night.
The Tar Heels suffered a damaging defeat, falling in thudding fashion to Pittsburgh 76-67 in an Atlantic Coast Conference basketball surprise at the Smith Center that could prove particularly harmful to North Carolina’s NCAA Tournament chances.
“We just didn’t play the way I hoped, anticipated, thought we would play,” Tar Heels coach Hubert Davis said. “With so much to play for.”
North Carolina arrived 13-1 here at home this season, coming off an exhilarating romp past Florida State and positioned third in the race for the ACC regular-season title – and meeting a Pittsburgh team with a losing record that’s ranked last in the league in scoring, and one of the worst in all of college basketball in that department.
What followed became both a disaster in real time and a nightmare that could come back to haunt the Tar Heels when the NCAA Tournament field is unveiled on March 13. Five regular-season games remain, and North Carolina had been considered a team with thin margins on the right side of the NCAA bubble by most bracket projections.
Until Wednesday night.
“I don’t think we were ready the way we needed to be,” North Carolina senior swingman Leaky Black said.
“We were upset,” Tar Heels guard Caleb Love said. “This is terrible loss.”
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Pittsburgh (11-16 overall, 6-10 ACC), most notably behind the strength of 6-foot-9, 280-pound John Hugley, neutralized Armando Bacot, the Tar Heels’ top scorer and rebounder. He had seven points and eight rebounds, and didn’t play during the game’s final 7:55 after picking up his fourth foul.
North Carolina (18-8, 10-5) was a mess, tumbling behind by 17 points in the first half and trailing by 21 in the final nine minutes, before uncorking a rally to within 69-63 that energized the anxious home crowd.
Love pumped in 13 straight points across one stretch of the late comeback. He finished with 19 points. Brady Manek added 12 points and 10 rebounds. Black and Kerwin Walton chipped in 11 points apiece for the Tar Heels.
Ithiel Horton’s 19 points and Hugley’s 18 points led five players in double figures for the visiting Panthers, coached by Jeff Capel, the former Duke standout and assistant coach. Pittsburgh assistant coach Jason Capel, the former North Carolina standout, spent parts of Wednesday night calling out the Tar Heels’ defenses.
Pitt led 40-23 at halftime, the third-largest deficit any North Carolina team has faced at the Smith Center. The Tar Heels’ 27.6-percent shooting from the field — after connecting on an unconscious 74.2 percent from the field during the first half of Saturday’s blasting of Florida State — checked in as the second-lowest for the Tar Heels in any half in this building.
This report will be updated with more information and comments.
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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 suffers damaging mark on NCAA résumé in loss to Pitt