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BLACKSBURG, VA – Make that four losses in a row for once-top ranked North Carolina, as the Tar Heels fell 80-72 to Virginia Tech on Sunday at Cassell Coliseum.

Carolina led for just 1:26 of the game, four days after leading for only 1:48 in a loss at Indiana. For all that went wrong for the Tar Heels – rebounding, perimeter shooting, limited ball awareness, and interior defense – they were still in position to complete a stunning comeback after being 18 points down in the second half.

Virginia Tech took a 57-39 lead with 12:38 remaining, but the Tar Heels stepped up their defense and gained one of the best stretches of offensive flow in some time. A 12-2 spurt was part of a 19-8 run, which was part of a 25-10 run culminating with a Caleb Love steal and layup.

He was fouled but missed the free throw, which would have cut the Hokies’ lead to two, but it remained 67-64.

Carolina got no closer in losing for the fourth time in the last 10 days.

North Carolina was without Preseason ACC Player of the Year Armando Bacot, who suffered a right shoulder contusion in the loss at Indiana on Wednesday night, and reserve guard D’Marco Dunn, who broke a bone in his left hand in practice Sunday.

UNC was ranked No. 1 this time a week ago, and when the new poll comes out Monday, it will not be there.

The Tar Heels dropped to 5-4 overall and 0-1 in the ACC, while the Hokies improved to 8-1 and 1-0.

Here are 5 Takeaways from UNC’s loss to Virginia Tech:

One thing UNC Coach Hubert Davis can take away from this game is how his team kept competing and quieted this hostile crowd. Carolina’s 25-10 run, which closed the margin to 67-64 with 3:06 remaining, had the scent of many vintage Carolina comebacks.

It included intensified defensive pressure, attacking offensively, scrappiness, and sparks off the bench to threaten the Hokies.

Included in the 25-10 run was 19-8 and 12-2 Carolina stretches, the Heels held the Hokies to 6-for-16 shooting from the field while connecting on 12 of 22 shots themselves.

Freshmen Seth Trimble and Tyler Nickel had huge roles in Carolina closing the gap. Trimble entered the game with 10:21 remaining and played the rest of the way. Nickel went in with 14:40 left, and only came out for offensive-defense substitutions swapping with Leaky Black over the final minute.

Davis was pleased his team made a game of it.

“I’m disappointed but I’m not discouraged,” he said. “I’m disappointed with the outcome, but I’m really happy with the fight over the last 15 minutes of the second half… It just came up short. I told them that I’m not panicked, I’m not any of that.”

Perhaps the most perplexing ongoing issue with the Tar Heels is their rebounding. Virginia Tech clobbered Carolina on the glass, 39-25, which includes 10-4 on the offensive glass. This was the fourth time this season UNC has allowed more offensive boards than it has grabbed.

Pete Nance led UNC with 10 boards, but nobody else had more than four (RJ Davis).

On the season, UNC has just 14 more total rebounds than its opponents, and 11 fewer offensive rebounds than its opponents. Long a staple of Carolina basketball, this team is nowhere near the norm for this program.

Four days after Indiana scored 50 points in the paint, Virginia Tech had 42 on Sunday. Many of those points were scored by veteran big man Justyn Mutts, who scored 21 of his game-high 27 points after the intermission.

In all, the Hokies were 17-for-25 on layups and 2-for-4 on dunk attempts. Thus, 29 of their 61 field goal attempts were basically right at the rim. UNC is now allowing 34.4 points per game in the paint while averaging 32.7. Rarely have Carolina teams scored less than opponents in the paint for long stretches of any season.

“He was making good moves,” Nance said about Mutts’ performance Sunday. “He got hot there, he was just taking it to the basket strong.”

This isn’t exactly a newsflash, but North Carolina is not a good perimeter shooting team. Nine games in, and the Tar Heels are converting 29.8 percent of their 3-pointers, which is No. 306 nationally.

Today, UNC was 3-for-17 (17.6 percent) from beyond the arc, and in the two contests this week, Carolina was 8-for-35, which is 22.9 percent.

Caleb Love was 2-for-5 at Cassell Coliseum while RJ Davis was 0-for-4. Both Love and Davis are shooting 26.2 percent from the perimeter on the season.

Clearly, for North Carolina’s offense to get going, the Tar Heels must start hitting shots from long range, especially Love and Davis.

“I’m optimistic we’re going to turn this whole thing around,” RJ Davis said, after agreeing hitting from the perimeter is the key to the team right now. “There’s still a lot of basketball games left in the season. We have a great group, and I’m convinced the shots will come and will fall.”

UNC’s assist numbers are way down this season, but the Heels did something seemingly unthinkable during Sunday’s game.

The Heels’ first two field goals were assisted, but then they went 30:27 of GAME TIME before registering their next assist. That came on a dunk by Pete Nance off a feed from Caleb Love. With that jam, Carolina had a stretch with four of six basketballs being assisted.

In the two games this week at Indiana and here versus the Hokies, UNC has just 11 assists on 44 field goals. On the season, UNC has assisted on only 39.3 percent of its buckets, compared to 54.1 percent a year ago. The Heels rank No. 349 nationally in that department.