One game after its biggest win of the season, North Carolina suffered arguably its most disappointing. The Tar Heels led for all of 57 seconds as Marquette ran away with an 83-70 victory Wednesday. It was the Heels' first loss in the Dean E. Smith Center this season.
It wasn’t just that Carolina lost the game, it was how it lost. The Heels came out flat like many of their early-season performances. Although they didn’t shoot the ball well early on, they compounded the problem by not showing much fight defensively either.
UNC (14-8) faced its biggest deficit of the season, 18 points, and trailed 45-29 at halftime. It likely left the Heels feeling a lot like Louisville felt on Saturday when they ran away from the Cardinals for a 45-point victory.
The second-half effort resembled more of the Carolina team that had won three of its last four. But that first half proved too big of a deficit to come back from.
Garrison Brooks scored 18 points to lead UNC (14-8).
Marquette (11-12) was paced by Dawson Garcia's 24 points.
The loss could put the Heels in a tenuous position for an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament with games against Florida State, at Syracuse and Duke remaining on the schedule.
Marquette (11-12) wasn’t even added to the schedule until Saturday, when the ACC officially postponed UNC’s game against Boston College. The Golden Eagles were facing a 10-day break between games and were interested in adding one even though it meant playing in a fourth-straight road game.
The win marked a successful return for former Duke player and assistant coach Steve Wojciechowski, who is now in his seventh season as the Golden Eagles’ head coach.
