UNC Dunks Duke For ACC Title
The latest in a long line of championships for No. 4 North Carolina was all about revenge and resiliency.
The Tar Heels (30-3) won their 15th Atlantic Coast Conference tournament Sunday by beating No. 1 Duke 83-68, capping a three-day run in which they defeated all three teams they lost to during the regular season.
Antawn Jamison, playing with a painful groin injury, was the hero as he has been all season for his team, scoring 22 points and grabbing a season-high 18 rebounds.
Shammond Williams, who scored 25 points in North Carolina's semifinal overtime victory against Maryland, added 19 points as the Tar Heels defended their ACC title.
Roshown McLeod led Duke (29-3) with 24 points and Chris Carrawell had 18, but the Blue Devils had another horrid shooting day - its third straight in the ACC postseason. Duke shot 33 percent and was only 11-of-32 on 3-pointers.
Similar to when Peyton Manning helped win an SEC football crown this season for Tennessee, Williams and Vince Carter led the North Carolina band in a rendition of the team's fight song during the post-game celebration.
The North Carolina crowd also chanted "one more year" when Jamison and Carter - both juniors - cut down the nets.
It was the third game of high drama this season for these two highly ranked teams and close rivals along Tobacco Road - that was before the Tar Heels used a 13-0 second-half run to pull away.
The win gave coach Bill Guthridge an ACC crown in his first season replacing Dean Smith and moves North Carolina's record against Duke in ACC finals to 6-2.
Duke's fate was sealed when it went more then seven minutes without a basket after the score was tied at 57-57 with 11:38 left.
The Blue Devils did close to 72-65 with 2:58 remaining, but unlike eight days ago when North Carolina blew a double-digit lead at Duke, the Tar Heels poured it on down the stretch.
A 7-0 run closed the deal as Ed Cota made two free throws, Carter converted a three-point play and Jamison had a slam dunk as the Tar Heels shot 54.4 percent.
Jamison ran a few layup drills in warmups but pulled himself out of the line just prior to tipoff. However, he still started and got more active as the first half progressed, finishing the opening period with 10 points and six rebounds in 16 minutes.
Duke controlled the tempo early and grabbed a seven-point lead before the Blue Devils were forced outside by North Carolina's zone defense and Duke started misfiring from long range, going 6-for-17 from beyond the arc.
The Tar Heels responded to an 8-0 Duke run with a 14-2 spurt of their own near the end of the half as Carter scored seven points, Williams five and Jamison two as North Carolina shot a sizzling 59.3 percent.
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