North Carolina Basketball: 2019-20 season overview of the Tar Heels
High Point: Battle 4 Atlantis (third place) win over No. 11 Oregon
There weren’t a ton of high points for North Carolina basketball in the 2019-20 season and since a season-opening win over Notre Dame doesn’t exactly qualify as a big-time win despite Anthony’s record-breaking performance, we went with the Tar Heels third-place win over Oregon at the Battle 4 Atlantis in the Bahamas.
In North Carolina’s win over then-No. 11 Oregon, Anthony continued his role as a hard-working offensive engine but fellow freshman Armando Bacot stole the show with his dominant presence inside.
Bacot only took nine field-goal attempts but managed a 23-point, 12-rebound double-double by bruising his way to 10 free throw attempts and knocking them down at a 90% clip. Oregon had no match for Bacot as both starting frontcourt players Francis Okoro and Shakur Juiston collected three personal fouls apiece battling him inside.
With the Ducks’ frontcourt occupied all game long, consensus first-team All-American point guard Payton Pritchard did his best to put the team on his back, notching 19 points, 6 assists, and 3 steals in 37 minutes.
But with Bacot’s big game, Anthony matching Pritchard’s 19 points, and some solid perimeter shooting from Brandon Robinson (3-for-7 shooting from 3-point range), the Tar Heels were too much for the Ducks on their way to a 6-1 record. At that point, the one-loss Tar Heels looked like a tough squad that would make some noise in the ACC despite some obvious flaws.
Low point: Clinching a share of last place in the ACC for the 1st time since 2002
This was an easy selection, as the overall disappointment of the season was the biggest storyline in Chapel Hill. The Tar Heels lost a ridiculous amount of talent from the 2018-19 team and though Roy Williams had a top-10 class coming in, Cole Anthony and Armando Bacot were going to have their work cut out for them. The duo performed well, combining for 28.1 points per game on the year, helping upperclassmen Garrison Brooks and co. through some of the toughest stretches of the year. But Anthony went down in December and the Tar Heels struggled mightily in his absence.
North Carolina lost to Boston College in Anthony’s first game back and things did not pick up from there, as the Tar Heels lost six more games (in a row) before the strung together their best stretch of the season, going 3-1 over their last four regular-season games.
Despite North Carolina basketball at least righting the ship a bit near the end, they couldn’t avoid the fate that Roy Williams wanted so desperately to avoid: a last-place finish.
The Tar Heels lost to bitter rivals Duke 89-76 in the regular-season finale, which clinched the season-sweep for Duke and a 6-14, last place ACC record for North Carolina. In that loss, North Carolina didn’t play well and Duke’s largest lead of the game was 14 points as they controlled throughout. The Tar Heels were physical in the paint and outrebounded Duke but Brooks was the Tar Heels main scorer without a ton of efficiency (9-for-22). With Anthony and Leaky Black unable to get their teammates involved to a high-degree (combined six assists and four turnovers), the Tar Heel offense was ground to a halt in the first half, leading to the 13-point loss.
The three-way last-place finish between Pittsburgh, Wake Forest, and North Carolina was the Tar Heels’ first last-place finish in the ACC since 2002, clearly the lowest point of the 2019-20 season.