North Carolina needed a bounce back and no player needed a good showing more than forward Brice Johnson.

Johnson finished with only four points at home against North Carolina State Tuesday night, but rose to the occasion at Miami. Johnson scored a game-high 22 points and grabbed 11 rebounds in a 73-64 conference win over the Hurricanes.

Johnson had his seventh double-double in league play, and his classmate J.P. Tokoto joined him, finishing with 10 points and 10 rebounds in a much needed road win for the Heels.

"He (Brice) was fantastic today," Williams said. "Maybe it's the warm weather."

Marcus Paige heated up in the second half, finishing with 15 points and Justin Jackson continued his aggressive play, finishing with 11. However, it was six in a row from Johnson that broke open a close game late in the game, allowing the Heels to escape sunny South Florida with a nine-point victory.

Johnson's spurt put UNC ahead five, but the Heels needed one more run to pull away for good. Miami tied the game at 50, but UNC guard Joel Berry II knocked down his first bucket of the day, a triple, to put Carolina ahead three.

"A Florida guy coming back down here and making a basket for us was big," Williams said.

Johnson's layup moments later made it a five-point game and the Heels pulled away in the final minutes for its 10th league win of the season.

It was a game of runs for the Tar Heels, who used a 10-0 run to get an eight point lead in the first half, and a 6-0 run to start the second half after taking a two-point lead into the locker room.

North Carolina improves to 20-9 overall and 10-6 in ACC play. It's the 56th time UNC has won at least 20 games in a season and 10th time in Roy Williams' 12 seasons at UNC. It was also the eighth double-double for Johnson this season.

Here's a deeper look inside the game …

*Brice, not Jonathan, was back. Johnson's double-double was clutch. Carolina needed him to have a big game against Miami and he delivered.

"I thought Brice was huge for us," Williams said. "Twenty-two points and 11 rebounds, the exact opposite of what he was on Tuesday. We need him to play like that."

*Depth. Six different UNC players scored in the first seven minutes, helping the Heels jump out to an impressive 14-6 lead. Seven total UNC players scored against the Hurricanes. The Tar Heels bench scored 24 points, led by Joel James, who scored six, all in the first half.

"Joel was big for us in the first half," Williams said. "Kennedy (Meeks) was stinking up the joint and Joel made some plays for us. I thought really in the first half, particular, he was big for us.

*Carolina played a lot better game in the second half, outscoring the 'Canes 41-34 after halftime.

"They paid attention at halftime what we talked about," Williams said. "In the second half I thought we were pretty doggone good. I was surprised we just shot 50%. I thought we moved the ball well and shot it even better than that.

*Williams could do without the turnovers from Tokoto, but the 10 points, 10 rebounds and six assists, was the balanced game he needed from the junior forward.

"I thought a couple of big time rebounds, where it was 'who's going to get it, who's going to get it?' J.P. came up and got it. We tried to get him to restructure what he's thinking because we played him at the two more and Justin Jackson at the three. The last few weeks we made it pretty clear that he is the three man and he has got to go to the boards now for us, and he has done a much better job for us during that time period."

*North Carolina is one of the best rebounding teams in the ACC and dominated the boards versus the Hurricanes. The Heels had a 42-28 advantage on the boards. Williams went big on several occasions in the second half, and more times than not, had four players crashing the glass.

"We wanted to have a big rebounding edge and thought we should have," Williams said.

*Carolina finally closed out a game. They couldn't seal the deal at Duke, and couldn't get over the hump after battling back against NCSU. When Miami tied the game at 50 in the second half, North Carolina fans probably got that "here we go again" feeling. But this time the Tar Heels found a way to finish strong.

"Today I think we were really good," Williams said. "We worked on it a little bit yesterday at practice. But just give the kids credit for it more.