WASHINGTON — After North Carolina took down fourth-seed Pitt in the semifinals of the ACC Tournament on Friday night, Tar Heels’ head coach Hubert Davis shared some strong remarks in support of Pitt’s hopes at an NCAA Tournament bid.
During the postgame press conference, one reporter asked Davis about the Panthers’ tournament hopes. The reporter said, “There’s a chance that Pittsburgh doesn’t make the tournament. They’re pretty much right on the edge of the bubble right now. How do you feel about that and kind of the overall state of the ACC on the bubble?”
“Just personally, that just doesn’t make sense at all,” Davis replied. “I don’t care what metric, whatever you look at. There’s no way that you can look at this game and look at Pitt and not say it’s definitively an NCAA Tournament team, and not just an NCAA Tournament team, a team that could go far in the tournament.”
Pitt led by as many as nine points in the first half, taking an early 13-0 run to ignite the Panther fans in attendance. Bub Carrington ran the show for the Panthers, excelling at the point guard position and navigating his way to a team-best 24 points. Guillermo Diaz-Graham also shined for Pitt early on, hitting back-to-back threes to launch Pitt towards a 35-33 lead at halftime. Pitt held North Carolina star RJ Davis to just six points in the first half, with Carrington spending lots of time guarding the conference player of the year.
In the second half, North Carolina began to pull away behind a resurgent Davis as well as a strong Armando Bacot inside. Bacot finished with 19 points and 11 rebounds against the Panthers, while Davis went 8 for 18 from the field to cap off the night with 25 points. Davis hit a late three pointer to bury the Panthers, who tried to battle back into it on the shoulders of Carrington. In addition. Blake Hinson and Ishmael Leggett – who had struggled during the first half to the tune of an 0-10 start to the game, hit big shots late. However, it was too little, too late for Pitt, who fell to the ‘Heels 72-65.
Davis and the Tar Heels advanced to the ACC title game with the win over the Panthers, and will likely earn a No. 1 seed in the upcoming NCAA Tournament. Despite the battle against a predicted No. 1 seed as well as a strong 22-win season for the Panthers. most bracketologists had Jeff Capel’s squad on the outside looking in as of Friday.
“[Pitt is] Extremely well-coached,” Davis continued. “Coach Capel does a fantastic job. The players that they have on there, not only are they big-time college players, they’ve got future NBA players over there, and they play together as a team. They gave us everything tonight, and for us to come away with the win, we’re very fortunate.”
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