Preview Against Notre Dame: Senior Night for #7 North Carolina

(Photo Courtesy Grant Halverson/GettyImages) 

By JEREMIAH ARTACHO

Chapel Hill, N.C. --- It's senior night in Chapel Hill as the #7 North Carolina Tar Heels take on the Notre Dame Fighting Irish (12-17, 7-11 conference) at the Dean Smith Center. The tip-off is scheduled for 7:00 p.m. on ACCN. 

 

North Carolina will celebrate all of the seniors as Armando Bacot, Cormac Ryan, Paxson Wojick, Rob Landry, Creighton Lebo, and Duwe Farris experience the beloved UNC fans one more time. 

 

For Armando Bacot in particular, the journey he has been on ever since his freshman year has been filled with many ups and downs. Fortunately, it's not the absolute last game for him in a Carolina blue uniform, as there's still a lot of basketball to be played. 

 

Coach Davis watched his squad complete a comeback win at home in their last outing against NC State. Going into the break, UNC faced an 8-point deficit but was able to erase that after getting into a scuffle sparked by Elliot Cadeau and NC State's Casey Morsell interaction. 

 

"That's something that we talked about before the game, is being competitive on the ball, whether it's a one-on-one situation ball screen, in the post. And in the second half, we stepped up, and I felt like we were making them work so hard to be able to get a shot that it was allowing them to miss shots. They were coming up short because of our presence on the ball," Coach Davis' comment about what led to UNC flipping the script during the second half. 

 

That chippy moment lit a fire in UNC, and ever since then, their play began to skyrocket, routing their 79-70 win over the Wolfpack. 

 

"I felt like when things got a little chippy, it ignited us a little bit as well... And I was really happy with how the guys responded in the second half," seconds after Coach Davis said, "I don't mind chippy," in response to whether he wants to see chippy or not from his team. 

 

The third-year coach also expressed his playing days from before: "I played in the '90s, where a fight could break out and you could still play; that was nothing." 

 

The pairing of Harrison Ingram and Elliot Cadeau worked wonders right from the start, and all game long, the two found ways to make an impact. One play saw Cadeau whipping a pass down the middle of the lane for an Ingram layup. 

 

Ingram completed the clash with a season-high of 22 points in addition to six rebounds and two steals. Cadeau reached double digits in points with 15 and was scratching the surface of a double-double, logging in seven assists. 

 

Armando Bacot and RJ Davis also added 13 and 14 points to the stat sheet, respectively. 

 

Notre Dame 

 

"I'm just proud of our guys, man. We talked about before the game... Clemson is an NCAA Tournament, right? That's not debatable; they're in the tournament. We talked about this is our chance to measure up against a team like that and see where we are and see what we look like. This is a second game in a row where we've gone in and made some adjustments at halftime and then really executed those adjustments. I'm proud of our guys," Coach Shrewsberry said about his thoughts during the postgame conference against Clemson. 

 

The freshman Markus Burton charged to the win with 21 points, six rebounds, and four assists while shooting eight for 16 from the field and two for six from behind the three-point line. 

 

Sophomore Tae Davis marked 18 points, five rebounds, and an assist during his 30 minutes on the floor. 

 

The Fighting Irish shot 24-57 against the Tigers' defense, converting 10 of their attempts from downtown out of 28. This picked up for their lack of points inside, where they were only able to obtain 18 through the two halves of basketball. 

 

"We're having fun man, like we're not thinking anymore. We're playing. Sometimes what we do offensively and defensively it takes some time to see, it, it takes some time to learn it. Especially like defensively, you need reps, need a lot of reps to get good at something and even though you do it so much in practice, you need game situations to build off of too. Offensively, our systems a little different; at the beginning of the year, I couldn't, and I still struggle now. I have the most fun in the games in the second half because it's like I got a joystick... I can tell them, 'You get over there, you come over here, you come right here, and we can execute it and we can get a bucket,'" Notre Dame's head coach spoke about the growth of his team. 

 

Out of their last six games, Notre Dame has won five of them. The Irish look to make more strides going into Chapel Hill later tonight. 

Projected Starting Lineups 

RJ Davis (SR)

Creighton Lebo (SR)

Rob Landry (SR)

Duwe Farris (JR)

Armando Bacot (SR)

Braeden Shrewsberry (FR) 

Markus Burton (FR) 

Carey Booth (FR)

Tae Davis (SO)

Kebba Njie (SO)

Key Matchup 

The point guard battle between the two freshman Elliot Cadeau and Markus Burton will be one of the key factors going into this matchup. Whoever can dictate their team's offensive better will be a crucial aspect of the game to pay closer attention to. 

The Projected Winner by the Numbers 

UNC is listed at 96.3%, according to the matchup predictor on ESPN Analytics.