Georgia Tech ousts North Carolina, 62-58

GREENSBORO, N.C. — Start fast, stumble to the finish. The preceding sentence perfectly summed up both North Carolina’s basketball season and its 62-58 first-round ACC tournament loss to Georgia Tech on Thursday evening.

The Tar Heels led by 10 at halftime. (The Tar Heels started the season 8-2 and were ranked as high as No. 6 in the Associated Press poll.) Carolina couldn’t handle that success, and hit an early-second half swoon, allowing Georgia Tech to score the first seven points after halftime. (Just past the midway point of the season, Carolina lost eight of 10 games, sending the Heels’ season into a spiral.)

See the trend here?

Down the stretch Thursday, just as it has been all season, Carolina was plagued with ball handling issues and poor shooting, and the Yellow Jackets took advantage. They outscored the Heels 38-24 after halftime. In the last 5:13, Carolina missed all eight of its field-goal attempts and turned it over twice, and Georgia Tech pulled away for a win that likely seals an NCAA tournament berth for the Yellow Jackets (20-11).

“It’s extremely disappointing, to say the least,” UNC coach Roy Williams said. “It’s been that kind of year. We played in stretches. In the first half, I was pleased with our effort, pleased with our concentration. … They come out and score the first seven points of the second half. We didn’t pick up on them. We didn’t box out on them. Bottom line is, we just couldn’t make a shot.”

Now Williams, whose teams at Kansas and North Carolina have made the NCAAs in every year they’ve been eligible, must deal with the reality that the only postseason play for Carolina this year will be in the NIT.

And that’s only if the second-tier tournament wants to take a flier on a 16-16 team that just happened to win the national championship last year.

“If someone’s going to invite me to play, I’m going to go and play,” Williams said. “Period. The end.”

Georgia Tech advances to tonight’s quarterfinal at 7 against Maryland, a team the Jackets had beat in College Park on Feb. 20 until Maryland’s Cliff Tucker drilled a buzzer-beating 3-pointer to stun Tech.

Despite Tech’s furious rally to open the second half, Carolina was still in the lead until Rambling Wreck super frosh Derrick Favors took over.

Favors scored eight straight points for Tech in a span of 1:15, helping the Jackets tie the game at 49 with 12:08 left.

“I think I just took it upon myself not to let my team lose,” Favors said. “There was an opportunity for me to score, so I took it.”

Favors scored 18 points, grabbed a team-high nine rebounds and blocked five shots. Gani Lawal scored 12 for Tech.

Tyler Zeller played his most complete game of the year for the Heels, finishing with 17 points and a career-high 10 rebounds.