CHAPEL HILL – Finding positives to build from hasn’t been the easiest task this basketball season for anyone involved with North Carolina’s program, though they’ve certainly tried.
Snippets could be found: Garrison Brooks growing his game and range; Christian Keeling recently playing more like the player everyone initially expected; and the team’s fortitude dealing with one bout of adversity after another are worthy storylines.
But when a team doesn’t win, it takes longer for such things to fully seep in, so forgive the Tar Heels if they’ve jumbled opportunities saying anything positive other than the standard “We’re gonna keep working” comments as the losses have piled up.
That’s what made Tuesday’s postgame interviews so interesting is the Tar Heels (11-17, 4-13 ACC) could outline expressions of good will and it wasn’t window dressing, it was real, as Carolina ended a seven-game losing streak by defeating N.C. State at the Smith Center.
“It feels amazing,” said senior Brandon Robinson, who owns a national championship ring from his freshman campaign. “It feels like forever the last time we got a win, and I’m just so happy we finally got one.”
Good vibes and a favorable result meant some of the questions for the Heels regarded turning one victory into two, which would match their longest winning streak since before Thanksgiving after starting the season 5-0.
“Building to get another win,” Brooks said, when asked to clarify an earlier comment about connecting the victory into something moving forward. “Yeah, building to get another win, that’s what I think.”
Since the Tar Heels defeated Alabama on Nov. 27 in the Bahamas to improve to 5-0, they lost the next day to Michigan before beating Oregon on the 29th, which preceded an ugly four-game losing streak. Wins over UCLA in Las Vegas and Yale at home were followed by a gut-wrenching five-game skid. A rout of Miami and win at N.C. State on Jan. 27 were backed up by losing seven straight games that included four last-possession losses.
Then came Tuesday.
So, building off wins hasn’t exactly been part of Carolina’s pattern this season. But maybe the way Tuesday’s game played out will serve as real evidence the Heels have truly grown some as a group.
They withstood a big second-half run for the first time seemingly in forever, hit their free throws in the second half, handled a late Wolfpack push, which included surviving some scary looking efforts against State’s full court press, and they didn’t give the Pack a chance to win at the buzzer.
Shew!
Maybe that's enough to allow the Heels to genuinely believing again.
“We’re learning from our mistakes,” Robinson said. “We’ve been playing good basketball up until the last four minutes, five minutes of the games.”
Six losses in last-possession thrillers with a few ugly performances sprinkled in have been a more dominant recent storyline over the rash of injuries resulting in nine different starting lineups. But guess what? Unless there are no surprise illnesses or freak injuries, the Tar Heels will take the floor at the Carrier Dome on Saturday at Syracuse about as healthy as anyone can expect at this point.
Intact with Brooks, Robinson and Cole Anthony on the floor along with a resurgent Keeling, and suddenly the glimmer of hope that has remained with these kids has more of a glow than just a flicker.
The ACC Tournament is just around the corner and the league is loaded with opportunities, so who knows. In what has been the craziest of crazy seasons, the Heels aren’t dead and buried yet, they say.
And who knows, maybe they’re right.
