Let it be said that despite the failure to close Tuesday night at home and the general apathy displayed against VT and NC State on the road, this team does bounce back well. For the fourth time this season UNC lost a game and followed it up with a huge pressure win, three of those times in an extremely difficult ACC road environment. UNC came out in this game and shot the ball well playing, in my opinion, their best game of the season. They really answered the bell for this one and took advantage of Boston College's general lack of defensive presence in the paint with a huge game from Hansbrough in the first half. Wayne Ellington played a much smarter game tonight, seemed to pick his shot more carefully, and showed us how good he could be.
All in all I am happy with the win. It clears a major hurdle and while the next four games will by no means be a picnic, if this win can serve as a confidence booster, then running the table through the rest of the regular season should not be a huge issue. This also takes care of one of the first place contenders. Since UNC owns the tiebreaker on Virginia, it does not much matter if they lose again or not. Virginia Tech is the key team to watch and they face a host of tough games starting with NC State on the road Sunday followed by a very angry BC team who cleaned their clocks at Chestnut Hill in the earlier matchup this season. Since UNC has tiebreaker issues with the Hokies I would rather they go ahead and lose, twice if possible to get them out of the way.
The challenge now is to steer clear of a letdown and take care of business down the stretch starting on Wednesday night with NC State.