North Carolina Tar Heels
Seed: 2
Record: 29-7
Conference: ACC
vs.
Kentucky Wildcats
Seed: 4
Record: 28-8
Conference: SEC
Date: Sunday, March 27
Time: 5:05 pm Eastern
Location: Newark, NJ
Region: East
Pretty shocking, right? Seeing North Carolina and Kentucky in the Elite Eight...
Team Comparisons with SportsRatings Statistics
North Carolina Kentucky
Power Ratings
Strength: #13 Strength: #7
Neutral court: #13 Neutral court: #7
Consistency: #320 Consistency: #131
Tempo-free: #15 Tempo-free: #7
Offense: #46 Offense: #8
Defense: #5 Defense: #20Special Analyses
2nd half of season: #11 2nd half of season: #10
Last 6 games: #31 Last 6 games: #8
- Wins vs. tournament teams (11): NC Asheville+11, Kentucky+2, Clemson+10, Florida St.+20, @Clemson+2, @Florida St.+2, Duke+14, Clemson+OT, Long Island+15, Washington+3, =Marquette+18
- Wins vs. Sweet Sixteen teams (5): Kentucky+2, Florida St.+20, @Florida St.+2, Duke+14, =Marquette+18
- Losses to tournament teams (5): =Vanderbilt-7, @Illinois-12, Texas-2, @Duke-6, =Duke-17
- Other losses (2): =Minnesota-5, @Georgia Tech-20
Key Info: Interestingly, North Carolina has more wins against the Sweet Sixteen than any other Sweet Sixteen team; they beat Kentucky in the pre-conference season, then beat FSU twice and Duke once. The previous Kentucky win was at home, of course.
North Carolina's play in the ACC tournament—and even in the first two games of the NCAA—was less than inspiring. They finally put it all together start to finish against Marquette, taking a 40-15 halftime lead and coasting to win by 18. Newswire stories emphasized North Carolina's defensive effort as if it were something unusual, but the Tar Heels rank in the top five in defensive efficiency (points allowed per possession). Ty Zeller had 27 points and 15 rebounds, and Harrison Barnes added 20.
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- Wins vs. tournament teams (13): =Washington+7, Boston University+34, Notre Dame+14, @Louisville+15, Georgia+6, Tennessee+12, Florida+8, Vanderbilt+2, @Tennessee+6, =Florida+16, =Princeton+2, =West Virginia+8, =Ohio St.+2
- Wins vs. Sweet Sixteen teams (3): Florida+8, =Florida+16, =Ohio St.+2
- Losses to tournament teams (5): =Connecticut-17, @North Carolina-2, @Georgia-7, @Florida-2, @Vanderbilt-4
- Other losses (3): @Alabama-2, @Mississippi-2, @Arkansas-OT
Key Info: As we've been saying since the first weekend's game reviews, Kentucky is one of the better 4-seeds you'll ever find, and they're proving it. They're good enough to be a 2-seed according to our power ratings, and if their performance dipped in a mid-season slump, it picked back up as they won their last six games to take the SEC tournament crown. It's fair to say it dipped again against 13-seed Princeton, whom the Wildcats escaped by just 2 points, but the West Virginia win was back to form, and beating Ohio State pretty much proved they were underseeded.
What they have accomplished is all the more impressive when you consider what they lost from last year's #1 seed team. John Wall, DeMarcus Cousins, and Patrick Patterson were among five (5!) Wildcats taken in the first round. But as he usually does, John Calipari recruited replacements and set about forming another star-studded team; this year freshmen Brandon Knight, Terrence Jones, and Doron Lamb are the team's leading scorers. Knight scored 30 points in the win over West Virginia, and against Ohio State senior big man Josh Harrellson led with 17 despite going up against Jared Sullinger.
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Game Analysis: Which is more impressive, destroying Marquette or simply getting a win over Ohio State? It's close, but I'd take an 18 point win over the Golden Eagles, especially considering the 40-15 halftime lead. However that halftime lead demonstrates that Friday night's UNC win was at least as much due to Marquette as it was to the Tar Heels. Marquette had been alternating between great performances and terrible ones, and it hit another terrible one against North Carolina. On the other hand, I give fully credit to Kentucky for beating Ohio State, regardless of how bad the Buckeyes shot (and much of that was due to Kentucky's defense, too).
And speaking of bad performances, North Carolina has been less-than-great in five of its last six games—particularly in the ACC tournament—whereas Kentucky has been solid five of its last six games. That's why UK is #8 over the last six, while UNC is just #31 despite making it to the Elite Eight. In NCAA tournament play (last 3 games) North Carolina ranks ahead, since that's where their best game and Kentucky's worst occurred.
Ty Zeller is coming off a 27-point game for North Carolina and he had 27 against Kentucky when the teams met in December. That 2-point UNC win was over three months ago and took place in Chapel Hill, however.
Vegas Line:
Kentucky by 1
Power rating spread
Kentucky by 1.6
% Chance to win
UNC: 44%
Kentucky: 56%
Some might be surprised to see Kentucky favored as a 4-seed facing a 2-seed, but they've been highly-rated in power ratings all season. 1.5 was the early consensus among the sportsbooks, then the line dropped to 1, all of which of course means the game could go either way in the last minutes. Our game-comparison system gives Kentucky just over 56% of the wins. Again, could go either way, which is typical for Elite Eight games and beyond.
Bottom Line: North Carolina played a great game against Marquette. But they only have that kind of game about once every five or six contests. Can they have two great efforts in a row? We haven't seen it all year. Well, once—but that was against Rutgers and St. Francis, PA, not Kentucky. The first Kentucky game was a 2-point UNC win that doesn't tell us anything.
For all the time-period comparisons possible, I think using all of each team's games makes for the best estimate. North Carolina is normally a good team but has an occasional great game; Kentucky is a slightly better team but occasionally underperforms. I think this time they get the 2 point win on the neutral court.
Final prediction: Kentucky 74, North Carolina 72
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