Carolina 73 - Tech 74

Oof.

Bad game. Bad loss. Bad reffing. Bad everything.

Gotta say though: despite the fact that Carolina has been winning, and has been fun to watch, they have not actually been playing that well. All that talk about the Final Four and whatnot...just not really warranted by what we were seeing on the court, IMO. They've definitely had some good games, and shown end-of-game focus and toughness...but their competition just hasn't been that great. And I've considered us to have been as much lucky as anything. We pulled away late to respectable leads in some cases in which we prooobably should have, instead, had a comfortable lead and cruised to wins.

And let's face it: Tech is just shit this year.

The officiating was not great--and that final no-call on the RJ layup was significant...but...

...the problem started and ended with the Heels.

Hard to see how you can miss so many shots while turning the ball over so much. It didn't seem that they had possession long enough to put up that many bricks...

Just bad, bad, bad.

Hubert's weird substitution patterns in the first half killed their momentum when they had it...and they never got it back. I'm sure he was trying things out with an eye to the future...but that may well have cost us the game.

Oh well.

They'd better play better--a whole lot better--on Saturday, or it could get really ugly.

[Addendum: RJ was absolutely mugged on the final shot. Even the announcers couldn't believe it was a no-call.]