UNC Basketball: Arkansas Game Thread

After soundly beating Portland on Thanksgiving Day, the Tar Heels move into the next round of the Phil Knight Invitational for a date with the Arkansas Razorbacks. You may remember that the last time these two teams met it nearly caused Carolina fans to go into heart failure, as Arkansas was up on UNC in the final minutes of the second round game of the NCAA Tournament in Greenville.

Of course, Carolina was able to pull out an improbable win in that game on their way to the national championship. However, you can bet that Arkansas would love nothing more than to flip the script this time around.

Everything went right for the 4-0 Heels while the rest of us were tending to our turkey. Luke Maye put up 20 points on his way to a double-double without needing to play the entire game, and his fellow starters Theo Pinson, Kenny Williams, and Joel Berry II all had double figure points as well. Even Andrew Platek had 12 points in just ten minutes of action off the bench.

Arkansas will be a tougher test for UNC. The Razorbacks took care of business against Oklahoma last night in order to advance. Daryl Macon led the way with 27 points with six of his eight three point shots finding the bottom of the net. Perimeter defense has been a point of contention with UNC at times, so they’ll need to step up their game in order to contain him.

We’ll be back after the game with all of the usual wrap up of the happenings. Until then...

Go Heels!