The North Carolina basketball team took the court on Tuesday and were all business. They took an early lead in the game and just kept extending it, leading to a 20-point win against Notre Dame in the second round of the ACC Tournament. They will advance to play Wake Forest tomorrow in the quarterfinals.
Jae’Lyn Withers finished with a North Carolina tournament record seven three-pointers, shooting 7-fo-10. Elliot Cadeau had 10 assists, while Ven-Allen Lubin posted the only double-double of the day for a Tar Heel with 17 points and 10 rebounds. Withers was one rebound away from his double-double, finishing with nine boards.
Here is what head coach Hubert Davis had to say about the exciting and explosive win from his team.
All quotes via Inside Carolina.
Hubert Davis on Withers opening the offense up with his shooting.
“Well, it does. Initially I thought we had really good spacing, a combination of ball and player movement, and one of the things that us as a group, as a team have talked about is generating good threes and coming off of dribble drive, attacking the paint through post penetration, even offensive rebounding. That’s really helped our three-point shooting over the last month, month and a half, and especially today. I felt like not just J-Wit’s threes, everyone’s threes. They were good threes generated by good offense, unselfishness, and as a result I thought we shot a really good percentage.”
Hubert Davis on his thoughts towards the NCAA Tournament.
“The pitch is we are focused. We were very fortunate to be successful against a really good Notre Dame team that was a one-point game earlier in the year in South Bend. Our eyes and our preparation is on what is real, and what is real is our preparation in regards to our play tomorrow against a very good Wake Forest team.”
Hubert Davis on Drake Powell guarding Markus Burton.
“Yeah, Drake is a gifted defensive player. He has — obviously he’s very athletic but he’s got tremendous length. He’s at 6’7″. I think one of the things that is most difficult against a scorer and especially Markus who leads the ACC in scoring is going up against length. So we just felt like starting the game off with Drake would make it even more difficult for him to be able to score. Markus is a great scorer because he can score from all three levels. He can get fouled, get to the free-throw line. He can go either direction. But I thought Drake’s length bothered him and made him work a little bit harder than usual.”
Hubert Davis on the team’s overall shooting performance.
“I wouldn’t attribute it to the lineup change. I would attribute it to the type of shots that we’re generating. One of the things that we always talk is dominating points in the paint through post, penetration and offensive rebounding. I think our rebounding numbers have grown a lot over the last month, month and a half. We’re driving, and I think you saw in this game we’re not settling for the good shot. We’re making the extra pass to the great shot. So I just think overall, our ability to create good threes, whether it’s through post penetration or offensive rebounding, sharing the basketball, has been the No. 1 factor in our percentage from three rising over the last month, month and a half.”
Hubert Davis on Cadeau’s assist/turnover ratio today.
“It’s huge. Elliot is gifted in regards to being able to find open teammates. He’s our best penetrator where he can break down a defense anytime he wants to, not only create for himself but create for his teammates. When he’s making the simple easy play, for him — for everyone else it’s elite. And I thought he did that for the most part, so I thought there was a couple lobs that he threw up, but when he keeps it simple, I think he’s one of the best distributors in the country.”
Hubert Davis on Wake Forest’s defense.
“Well, I think one of the things is they’re really good individual defenders. They can guard the ball. They take pride in their individual one-on-one matchups. They have clearly as a team identified for them to be successful, they have to be good on the defensive end, and they’ve got athleticism and length. They do. So they make it tough to be able to get consistent good shots, high-percentage shots on the offensive end. We’re looking forward to the challenge tomorrow afternoon and understand Wake Forest is a very good basketball team.”
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This article originally appeared on Tar Heels Wire: What Hubert Davis said after UNC basketball’s win over Notre Dame
