Michigan State played a hack of a defensive game against UNC, holding the Heels to a 38% shooting average and suppressing UNC’s shooting from beyond the arc for a 74-58 victory. A combination of poor play by UNC and excellent execution by the Spartans led to the Heels suffering their first loss of the season.
However, Carolina won’t have much time to heal her wound; the next opponent is another top 25 in Kentucky. The Wildcats are a bit of a mystery this season; they’re 5-2, but all five wins have been against a team ranked 250th or worse by KenPom, while the losses are to top 25 teams Louisville and Michigan State. Kentucky is hoping this game becomes its first win, while the Heels are hoping to have a two-game losing streak this early in the season.
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UNC’s first road game
The Heels have played seven games, but this will be their first real road game of the season. Their first five matches took place within the comfortable confines of the Dean Dome; the last two were neutral-site matchups in Florida as part of the Fort Meyers Tip-Off. UNC’s game against Kentucky will be their only true road game in the non-conference portion of Carolina’s schedule.
Playing at Rupp Arena is never easy for the visiting team. This is the second largest college basketball stadium by capacity, and British basketball fans are about as loud as they come. UNC looked a little shaken in the second half of its game against Michigan State; Although a lot of it was probably due to the Spartans’ defense, I noticed that the MSU fan contingent was making a lot of noise. Playing in a top 25 game in front of a hostile crowd will help the Heels get to Durham and Raleigh.
Kentucky guard rotation
Kentucky has been seriously affected by major injuries this season. Prized transfer Jayden Quaintance has yet to appear on the field as he recovers from a knee injury he suffered while at Arizona State that ultimately required surgery. Junior forward Mo Dioubaté has been out since being injured in UK’s loss to Michigan State, and his return timetable is unknown.
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Perhaps the biggest blow for the Wildcats was the loss of point guard Jaland Lowe to a shoulder injury. Lowe injured his shoulder during the Kentucky Blue/White scrimmage and aggravated it after playing in two games. He may need season-ending surgery. Either way, he shouldn’t play against UNC.
Lowe was supposed to be the engine that made the British offensive work. Denzel Aberdeen has gotten the lion’s share of the point guard’s minutes in Lowe’s absence but doesn’t have the same ceiling as the Pitt transfer (Lowe had 33 points and 8 assists in his two games combined against the Heels last year). Kentucky will miss him as long as he’s out, but the question is whether the Heels can take advantage while missing Seth Trimble.
How does the ACC fare against the SEC in the ACC/SEC Challenge?
Last year was a bad year for ACC basketball. The league lagged well behind other power conferences in almost every available metric and suffered many bad non-conference losses. The culmination of this situation was the league only getting four of its 18 teams into the NCAA tournament; only two teams have won a game in the Big Dance, one being UNC’s first-round victory over San Diego State in Dayton.
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The ACC is unlikely to be this bad this year, but the ACC/SEC challenge is an opportunity to change the narrative that has surrounded the ACC in recent years. The SEC was the best conference in the country last year and absolutely beat the ACC in their head-to-head matchups in the annual challenge by winning 14 of 16 games. Metrics such as KenPom I currently have the SEC as my best conference. in the country. The ACC doesn’t necessarily need to win the Challenge to earn some respect, but it needs to at least keep it close. Competitive losses or wins against the SEC will strengthen the ACC metrics when the NCAA begins determining what a Quad 1 win is for the NCAA Tournament in March. Quad 4 conference games are landmines that UNC doesn’t need on its schedule in January and February.
