Why Roy Williams decided to empty his bench with 10 minutes left against Ohio State
There were about four minutes left in North Carolina’s game against Ohio State when Roy Williams finally looked into the stands.
What he saw didn’t shock him. He saw Tar Heels fans leaving the Dean Smith Center in lines like school kids exiting a building during a fire drill. They had seen enough.
“I didn’t blame them,” Williams said. “I wasn’t mad at them. We didn’t do what we should do to provide a little bit more toughness.”
The seventh-ranked Tar Heels (6-2, 1-0 ACC) were historically bad on Wednesday. They lost to the sixth-ranked Buckeyes 74-49. It was their worst home loss since Williams became head coach in 2003. And no matter what he tried, including going deep — no, really deep — into his bench late in the second half, nothing worked.
Williams said he wasn’t trying to send a message to his team by putting in two non-scholarship players and three reserves. He said the starters just weren’t good.
“If you were watching us play, what were those guys doing that were in the game?” Williams said. “It’s a pretty easy thing; if you suck out there, somebody should come in for you.”
“No. Seriously,” he continued, “if they didn’t have a message by looking at the scoreboard — I put those five guys in there because I didn’t like the guys that were playing.”
The Tar Heels trailed by 14 points with about 10 minutes left before Williams replaced his starters with guards K.J. Smith, Shea Rush, Christian Keeling, and forwards Justin Pierce and Walker Miller.
That lineup was actually decent. But when the starters returned with 6:37 left in the game, the same mistakes continued. The Tar Heels allowed 16 second-chance points, and 11 fast-break points. The Buckeyes also dominated the Tar Heels on the boards, 48-32.
Hitting some bad marks
The Tar Heels set a number of records in the Dean Smith Center on Wednesday. And not the good kind. The 25-point loss was the biggest at home since a 29-point defeat to Duke in 2002.
And their 27.4 shooting percentage was their worst shooting performance ever in this building.
Even freshman guard Cole Anthony struggled. He scored 15 points but was 4 of 15 from the floor. He had an upper respiratory infection earlier in the week and was not available to the media Wednesday night.
The Tar Heels’ shooting woes are nothing new. They haven’t shot above 50 percent in any game this season, which is also a first under Williams through his first eight games.
Some of UNC’s poor performance can be attributed to Ohio State’s defense and freshman forward Armando Bacot’s injury.
Ohio State entered with the second-best defense in the country. They allowed 84.8 points per 100 possessions. And Bacot’s ankle injury in the first half meant the Tar Heels were without their best rebounder, shot blocker and a 11.7 points per game scorer.
“He is so much a part of what they do — on the glass, in the post, their size,” Ohio State coach Chris Holtmann said. “It was a tremendous difference.”
Bacot also seemed to be catching his stride recently. He scored 23 points, had 12 rebounds and 6 blocks in the Tar Heels’ win over Oregon last week. Williams said by the time Bacot got to the locker room, his ankle had swelled up.
“My guess is he’ll be out a while,” Williams said.
UNC junior forward Garrison Brooks shook his head when asked what it’d be like to replace Bacot.
“It’s going to be tough,” he said, looking down at the table he was sitting at. “I think we can do it, but it’s going to be really hard.”
Second-half meltdown
Despite the loss of Bacot, and their offensive struggles, the Tar Heels trailed by only two points at halftime. They played suffocating defense at times and forced the Buckeyes into 10 first-half turnovers.
But their inability to score seemed to weigh heavy on them in the second half. Their effort seemed to drop and the Buckeyes scored easy fastbreak layups and hit too many open 3-pointers. The Buckeyes shot 53.6 percent in the second half.
That’s part of the reason Williams emptied his bench so early.
UNC senior guard Brandon Robinson said he agreed with Williams’ decision. He said it came down to a lack of effort, but did not seem overly concerned with the Tar Heels’ play moving forward.
“I mean, I’m definitely worried because we’re not playing our best right now,” he said. “But it’s the beginning of the season. Nobody wins a championship now.”
This story was originally published December 5, 2019 at 3:10 AM.
