North Carolina women’s basketball team loses first game of season at NC State, 72-45
While building a perfect record through 13 games, the No. 19 North Carolina women’s basketball team rarely found itself trailing on the scoreboard.
No. 5 N.C. State changed that from the start Thursday night, scoring the game’s first 10 points, building a 17-point lead after one quarter and rolling to a 72-45 ACC win over the Tar Heels at Reynolds Coliseum.
“It was not a great time to not play well,” UNC coach Courtney Banghart said. “We didn’t shoot well. That’s easily seen on the stat sheet. But we also just didn’t play well on either end. Our pace, our purpose or our connectedness, we just we weren’t; I told them that wasn’t a team I recognize.”
The Tar Heels (13-1, 3-1 ACC) had only trailed in five of their 13 games prior to Thursday, outsourcing their opponents in 42 of 52 quarters.
But the ACC-leading offense that fueled all that success struggled to find a groove against the Wolfpack. Averaging 83.1 points per game this season, UNC barely hit half that total, which Banghart said “surprised” her.
“Whether it was calling a set, when we called a set, it was the pace at which we did things tonight that was really not good enough,” Banghart said. “I get that that sounds like attention to detail, but it’s really not. It’s execution. And we didn’t do that.”
The Tar Heels scored just seven in the first quarter while hitting only 3 of 14 shots.
“Obviously, tonight wasn’t our best performance,” said UNC guard Alyssa Ustby, who scored 12 points on 3-of-10 shooting and turned the ball over six times. “N.C. State came out in the first quarter and threw a punch. Kind of like coach was saying, we weren’t as sharp as we needed to be.”
UNC’s slow start allowed N.C. State to build a 24-7 advantage, and the Tar Heels never cut that margin back to single digits. That’s because UNC’s shooting, normally a strength at 45.2% for the season, was just 23.1% (15 of 65) against the Wolfpack.
“I don’t think N.C. State was doing anything in particular to disrupt our offense,” Ustby said. “I think back to what I said before, we just weren’t sharp on the offensive end and that cost us. We couldn’t keep up with them.”
After firing up N.C. State’s fan base by calling Reynolds Coliseum a “small gym,” Banghart wouldn’t place blame on atmosphere for her team’s poor performance. Rather, she said conditions were more difficult when the Tar Heels played a tournament in the Caribbean in November.
“I mean, actually, I gotta say the gym in the Bahamas was even louder and hotter,” Banghart said. “So, I would like to blame it on on anything else. But that’s not really what we’re about.”
A 17.5 points per game scorer this season, sophomore guard Deja Kelly did what she could, tallying 21 points to lead UNC. But the Wolfpack made her work hard for her points. She hit just 8-of-24 shots.
UNC found very few easy points as the taller Wolfpack simply refused to let UNC get anything going inside. Elissa Cunane, N.C. State’s 6-5 senior center, dominated under the basket with 19 points and 13 rebounds.
By easily winning the rebounding battle 50-37, N.C. State allowed the Tar Heels very few put-back chances. UNC tallied just five second-chance points and 14 points in the paint for the entire game.
The Wolfpack was the first ranked team the Tar Heels have played this season. It won’t be the last, with other ACC teams in the Top 25 like No. 3 Louisville, No. 16 Georgia Tech, No. 17 Duke and No. 20 Notre Dame ahead on UNC’s schedule.
“There’s a lot we can learn,” Kelly said. “This was probably the best test we got all season. This is our first test of adversity. For us to really lock in and move on and learn from this game is really important to us. And to stay connected like we have been all throughout the season, defensively, offensively.”
This story was originally published January 6, 2022 at 9:46 PM.