NEW YORK _ Defense has been Virginia's calling card under Tony Bennett. The Cavaliers' 3-point shooting carried them to the ACC title on Saturday.
Sophomore guard Kyle Guy scored 16 points and Virginia shot 52.9 percent from the 3-point line to beat North Carolina 71-63 in the ACC tournament championship game.
Bennett has led Virginia (31-2) to two ACC titles in the past five years. This is the same school that had one in its first 60 years in the conference.
The Tar Heels (25-10), playing their fourth game in four days, actually shot relatively well (41.7 percent) against the country's top-rated defense but couldn't contain the Wahoos from the outside. Guy, Ty Jerome (12 points) and Devon Hall (15 points) combined to go 7 for 13 from the 3-point line.
Junior forward Luke Maye led UNC with 20 points and UNC went 10 for 21 from 3 but Virginia kept the game at its preferred pace and stayed in front of UNC for all but 54 seconds of the game.
Maye had 15 points in the first half and made five of his first seven shots. The Heels needed Maye's scoring with Theo Pinson going 0 for 5 in the first half and guard Joel Berry limited to three points in the first half.
Virginia got eight points in the first half from backup guard Nigel Johnson. The Rutgers transfer had scored a total of three points Virginia's first four games in March.
A pair of free throws by Hall led to a 34-24 lead with 2:30 left in the half, but UNC scored the final six points of the half. UNC got as close as 50-47, with 10:27 in the second half, but Virginia's defense clamped down and the 3s kept falling.
