Texas Basketball: 3 takeaways from Maui Invitational final win over UNC

3) Takeaways from Texas basketball’s win over UNC

Armando Bacot and Garrison Brooks are a load to deal with

The two players for the Tar Heels that really made this a game were standout sophomore 6-foot-10 and 235 pound big man Armando Bacot and senior 6-foot-9 and 235 pound forward Garrison Brooks. That forward/big man pairing of Bacot and Brooks pushed the Tar Heels to put up 39 points in the second half compared to 29 for the Longhorns.

Bacot registered 10 points, 12 rebounds, and one block. It was the first double-double of the season for Bacot, although he had come close at different points in UNC’s first three games of the season. He was one of two Tar Heels that finished up the game in double digits for rebounds, leading them to edge the Longhorns in that department by a margin of 50-32.

Brooks led the way for the Tar Heels in the scoring department. He registered a team-high 18 points, to go along with seven rebounds, no assists, and two blocks. Brooks shot 7-of-12 from the field and 4-of-7 from the charity stripes in one of his better games of the season so far. Texas really could not get much going down low against Bacot and Brooks. Senior Texas center Jericho Sims registered just three rebounds, and no points in this game.

Texas got lucky in the fact that UNC wasn’t able to capitalize on a lot of their whopping 20 offensive rebounds in this game. And a lot of the suffocating perimeter and transition defense of the Longhorns did help to stifle some of the edge that UNC had in the rebounding department. UNC did have 14 turnovers compared to 11 for Texas.