(Note: Roy Williams' complete Friday press conference below)

CHAPEL HILL – North Carolina’s still isn’t where it needs to be defensively, and it may never satisfy Roy Williams, but the Tar Heels are making progress, of which even their coach acknowledges.

Of course, Williams tends to focus on what his team isn’t doing up to snuff, and until the final second ticks off the clock ending the season, he’ll find things to harp on about their defensive play.

As for what’s gotten better, there’s no specific area, Williams says, but the progress has been very real, and it’s been accompanied by some of the players taking more responsibility over performances.

“I think they’ve taken more ownership completely on the defensive end of the floor than they were early,” Williams said Friday at the Smith Center during a press conference in advance of Saturday’s game at Clemson.

“Earlier, I felt like I was down on my knees begging, scolding, hitting them over the head with a brook, whatever it was, every single day, and I’ve seen some improvement.”

At halftime of Tuesday’s win over Syracuse, Williams jumped on his team, firing many of the same reminders to them he has for much of the season. The Orange got plenty of open looks on the perimeter and hitting most, a reason they led by three points and had put 46 points on the board, 23 fewer than their season average for a full game.

“I got on them at halftime the other night because one of the things that we do is we spend a lot of time making out a scouting report, and if we spend that much time making out a scouting report and say ‘this guy can shoot,’ then don’t test him, we know he can,” Williams said. “So, I got on them a great deal the other night about following what we told (them) to do ad I think they were much better in the second half.”

There were times earlier in the season when Carolina was very poor defensively. Texas, Michigan, Gonzaga and Louisville (at home) each converted more than half of their field goal attempts. UCLA shot 45.5 percent from 3-point range and Kentucky, which made just 43.1 percent of its attempts, uncharacteristically missed a boatload of wide open looks.

Those games all took place through Carolina’s first 16 contests. Since then, however, only N.C. State (50 percent) and Virginia (53.3) have made at least half of their attempts, with the highly-efficient Cavaliers doing it on only 45 field goal attempts.

Furthermore, the three opponents prior to Tuesday night collectively shot 32.8 percent from the field, including 23.7 from the perimeter.

Steady improvement, for sure, but in no one specific area, though Williams does stress a certain aspect more than anything else.

“It’s not like in golf where your chipping is different from your driving because on the defensive end of the floor staying in front of the ball is a lot different than boxing out, but it all goes together so much,” he said. “I’d still probably say staying in front of the ball is the biggest thing but that’s the hardest thing.

“Kids can do so much with the ball. Palming the ball is never called, and they (players) do it a lot, so it’s almost impossible for a good player not to be to get you into the lane because you can’t stay in front of him. It’s still the thing we need to work on the most.”

Carolina’s improvement is without debate, but how much better can this team get on that end of the floor?

“I definitely think we can get a lot better on the defensive end of the floor…,” Williams said. “It’s got to be total concentration one hundred percent of the time that you’re out there on the court and taking the information that we give you on the scouting report and put that to use, and then do the things that we practice every day. But I do believe we can get a lot better defensively.”

Many of the Heels said effort and communication were issues defensively in November and December, so since the effort element has been addressed what about the communication?

“A little improvement,” Williams said. “People say, ‘boy you’ve gotten a lot better defensive,’ did you watch what the crap I watched the first half two or three nights ago? I don’t think you could put that in that area. So, I don’t think we’ve gotten a lot better, but I think daily, daily, daily we’ve gotten a little bit better.

“I think talking is one thing we’ve emphasized all year and we’ll do really well on two possessions and then the next two possessions (Not so well).”

The raw numbers...

The Tar Heels are ranked No. 13 overall in adjusted defensive efficiency on KenPom, dropping from No. 10 prior to the Syracuse game. They are No. 63 nationally in field goal percentage defense, allowing opponents to shoot 41.5 percent, including 37.3 from 3-point range, which is good for No. 54 in the nation.