UNC 69, Murray State 65
I was a little concerned going into this game not only because Murray State had a lot of success during the season (highlighted by winning the Ohio Valley Conference Tournament) but also because they had a lot experience (they started 3 seniors, 1 junior and 1 sophomore). We've had difficulty this year against the few experienced teams we played. We didn't play that well in the first half, but were able to pick it up over the last 4 minutes of the game to eek out a win.
By the half, we had a 1 point deficit. Neither team was shooting that well, but Murray State had taken 37 shots (shooting 32%) while UNC had taken only 23 shots (shooting 39%). They were out-hustling us to the ball. We have to get back the intensity we had at the end of the ACC season or we won't be going much further.
Interesting note: for all 4 Friday evening games, the low seeds were winning at the half.
I hate talking about the refs, but they deserve a mention. They were terribly inconsistent during the game (on both sides) and some of the calls were comical. They replayed a few of the calls and the refs were wrong on several occasions. It was made worse by one of the announcers, Len Elmore. Even when there was a bad call, he wouldn't acknowledge it and instead critiqued the player in which the bogus call went against. For example, Tyler Hansbrough was fouled after a steal at half court but the refs called a travel. Elmore said Hansbrough was out of control which is why he traveled (the replay showed an obvious foul). Ugh. He did this several times throughout the game and it was very annoying.
Hansbrough was the high scorer on the game with 24. Murray State didn't have an answer for him. Danny Green was a huge spark off the bench scoring 15 points. David Noel had a quiet game and during the second half he was very timid on the offensive side of the ball. He passed a couple of wide open looks. Reyshawn Terry had some good moments including an awesome dunk in the first half.
With 1 minute to go, the game was all tied up. Hansbrough made a clutch jumper to put UNC up by 2 with 38 seconds to go. Murray State wasn't able to convert and we sneaked out of there with a win.
We play Wichita State Sunday at 2:20pm.
