In Sunday’s ACC Action, UNC beat Georgetown 81-61, UNLV nipped Stanford 75-74, Hofstra knocked off Pitt 80-73 and SMU survived Texas A&M in overtime, 93-80.
UNC put the Julian Alexander unis away for the Dean Smith era throwback uniforms but didn’t have too much trouble with Georgetown as they did in 1982. It was close at halftime with the Tar Heels up 44-39 but in the end, UNC smothered Georgetown with Caleb Wilson (20 points and 14 rebounds) and Henri Veesaar (18 points and 15 rebounds) inside and a useful three point attack outside (UNC hit 9-28 for 27 points).
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UNC is playing really well right now and that’s without Seth Trimble, who should be back around Christmas or so, which leads to an interesting dilemma: who sits?
Our money is on Jarin Stevenson. He hasn’t been overly productive and Trimble is athletic enough to play forward, or they could move Luka Bogavac up.
Then of course they have to figure out what to do with freshman Derek Dixon, who has really come on lately. Will he supplant Kyan Evans at point?
This leads to our primary criticism of Hubert Davis: he doesn’t seem to have very good people skills, at least not as a coach. It’ll be interesting to see how he handles these looming personnel issues.
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Stanford has been a pleasant surprise so far but they had issues with Josh Pastner’s UNLV team, losing 75-74.
Ebuka Okorie tied the game 74-74 at the line with :14 left, then UNLV’s Kimani Hamilton got to the line himself, with :02 left and hit one. Good enough! Okorie missed a desperation shot and that was that.
Okorie didn’t shoot well (4-16/1-6)but finished with 18 to continue his strong freshman season.
Here’s what Pastner said afterwards: “I’m beyond proud of our young men, to fight, to scrap, to kick, to claw. We won the game through defense. We really guarded at a high level, and that was the bottom line.”
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Tell the truth: did you miss this? Did you?
There’s no sugar coating Pitt’s loss to Hofstra because it was ugly. Hofstra’s Cruz Davis put himself on the portal radar with a 36 point outing. Brandon Cummings nearly matched that for Pitt, hitting 34 on 10-15/5-8.
Really, Pitt had no business losing to Hofstra, which Capel acknowledged afterwards, saying this: “I’m not doing a good job with what I’m saying, what I’m trying to do. What we’re trying to work on is not resonating … The physical and mental stamina that’s required to be a good team, we don’t have that right now. That’s something we have to continue to try to work on, continue to try to develop, and, hopefully, at some point, we get it.”
Don’t wait too long.
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Finally, SMU got a nice win over Texas A&M. The Mustangs led for much of the game but A&M rallied and were up 77-72 before SMU pushed the game into overtime. Jaron Pierre racked up 35, including 5 straight in OT.
This is the first year for Bucky McMillan at A&M and he’s still getting his system and expectations in place, but we think he’s going to do well.
Former Duke commit Mackenzie Mgbako, who bailed on Duke for Indiana, is now an Aggie. He had 13 points and 7 rebounds.
More good news for SMU: promising recruit Jaden Toombs, who was out with a wrist injury, is back. He played in the loss against Vandy and now against A&M. He’s a talented big man who could emerge as a serious force for the Ponies as soon as he gets himself back in game shape.
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No games on Monday but looks like a good one on Tuesday as Clemson squares off against BYU in the Garden.
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