NC State
North Carolina
McCants Lifts North Carolina Past NC State, 71-64
2/29/2004 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Feb. 29, 2004
By Tony Haynes
Raleigh, N.C. - In the latest installment of the North Carolina - NC State rivalry, it was a North Carolina native who made the difference. Asheville's Rashad McCants, the ACC's leading scorer, tallied 22 points and buried two clutch 3-pointers late in the game as the 12th ranked Tar Heels held off the Wolfpack, 71-64. It was McCants' heroics that allowed Carolina (17-8, 7-7) to bounce back after No. 14 NC State (18-7, 10-4) had come all the way back from a 13-point halftime deficit to take the lead with less than seven minutes to play.
Along with losing its first game at home this season, the Wolfpack may have lost guard Scooter Sherrill for awhile. After scoring his first and only basket of the game following an offensive rebound early in the second half, the senior turned his ankle after landing awkwardly on McCants' foot under the basket. Although X-rays were negative, the injury was characterized as a fairly severe sprain by the NC State training staff.
On a night when UNC got 15 points from Jawad Williams, 11 from Sean May and 10 from point guard Raymond Felton, it was McCants who stepped up and made two big-time plays after NC State had brought the raucous crowd of 19, 722 out of its seats with a furious second half rally.
The first big shot came after Engin Atsur had given the Wolfpack a 56-54 advantage on a driving layup with 4:19 left. Trying to shake Julius Hodge off of a David Noel screen on the left wing, McCants buried a 20-footer to put the Tar Heels back in front 57-56. Then on North Carolina's next possession, he really stuck a dagger in NC State's heart by drilling another contested 3 at the end of the shot clock to make it 60-56 with 3:06 remaining.
"He just made some incredible shots down the homestretch for North Carolina," said Pack head coach Herb Sendek. "From courtside, it seemed like we were right there, draped all over him. He was well beyond the arc. He just made two incredible shots."
The Tar Heels then got another tough shot to fall after an Atsur bomb had pulled the Pack within three points at 62-59. With the shot clock winding down, Felton penetrated into the lane and threw up a runner that hit the front of the rim twice before tumbling through the net to give UNC a 64-59 lead with 1:05 left. From that point on, NC State would get no closer than four points as the Tar Heels closed out a season sweep in the series.
"We feel very fortunate to say the least," said North Carolina coach Roy Williams. "We've had several games this year where we were in a position to make some plays and didn't make the plays. Today, I think Jawad Williams hit a big-time 3 from the corner that was huge for us. Then we were down when Rashad made his shots. Those are big time shots. We haven't been able to do that this year, so we feel good about that."
He certainly had to feel good about the play of Williams, who responded to being pulled from the starting line-up. The 6-9 junior hit 6-of-7 shots from the floor, including the 3-pointer to which his coach referred, a shot that came right after a Marcus Melvin shot from the arc that had given the Wolfpack its first lead of the second half with 6:21 remaining.
The combination of North Carolina playing one of its best halves of the year and NC State one of its worst, allowed the Tar Heels to build a fairly commanding 40-27 advantage at intermission. While UNC shot a blistering 57.1 percent (16-of-28) in the first 20 minutes, the Pack hit just 10-of-35 overall and only 3-of-16 from the arc.
Afterwards, Wolfpack players were at a loss to explain the sluggish first half performance in what was a big game between two rivals.
"I'm not quite sure," said Ilian Evtimov, who scored 10 points to go along with four rebounds. "In a big game like this you expect to come out of the gate ready to play. I know we didn't play hard enough. Everybody, including me, knows that. We could have stepped up and played harder. That's why we missed so many shots because we weren't in rhythm."
But the Pack certainly got its act together to start the second half and came out with a lot more energy on the defensive end. Forcing a rash of North Carolina turnovers, NC State scored the first 10 points over the first five minutes to cut UNC's lead down to 40-37, forcing Williams to burn a timeout.
"We didn't do ourselves any favors by the way we came out and played in the first half," Sendek said. "Our guys certainly battled back and put themselves in a position to win before McCants took over. We really played pretty good defense in the second half. We can't say the same thing about the first half though."
And after the Wolfpack made its early rush to get close, the rest of the second half was a rough and tumble war with both teams banging inside and diving on the floor for loose balls. It ultimately came down to who would make the big shots and the big plays. As it turned out, McCants was the man, hitting two tough 3s that may have put the Tar Heels in the NCAA Tournament for the first time in three years.
"The way we came back in the second half, we should have played that way the whole game," Evtimov said. "If we would have played that way, Carolina couldn't have stayed with us. They outworked us and they played harder than us. We deserved to lose."
The Wolfpack was led by forward Marcus Melvin, who finished with 18 points and 10 rebounds. Julius Hodge added 13 points and Atsur 10 for NC State, which saw its lead over 3rd place Wake Forest in the standings shrink to just one game.
And while NC State lost Sherrill early in the second half, North Carolina played the entire game without defensive ace Jackie Manual, who didn't dress after spraining an ankle in practice late last week. Williams opened with a smaller line-up that left Jawad Williams on the bench and David Noel in to start on Evtimov, who had tortured bigger post players that had tried to guard him away from the basket in recent weeks.
The Tar Heels also played more of their point zone on Sunday and held NC State to just 35.9 percent shooting overall (23-of-64) and 8-of-34 from the 3-point arc. North Carolina shot 55.6 percent, including an efficient 8-of-16 from 3-point range. The Heels also were able to overcome 17 turnovers by winning the battle of the boards 36-30
