GREENSBORO - Mention the Atlantic Coast Conference and the first two things that come to mind for most fans are Duke and North Carolina. In an era of change within the membership of the conference, there seems to be a change at the top as well.
No longer are the Tar Heels and Blue Devils the bullies of the league as for the second straight season, those perennial powers watched another team celebrate on the floor of the Greensboro Coliseum with the ACC championship in their back pocket.
The Miami Hurricanes backed-up their regular-season championship with an ACC Tournament title, topping the Tar Heels 87-77 Sunday at the Greensboro Coliseum.
The win gives the Hurricanes their first-ever basketball tournament championship in any conference. The Hurricanes shared the 2000 Big East regular season crown and won this year’s regular season ACC title, which represents their only basketball titles.
The win by Miami gives the Sunshine State two straight ACC titles as Florida State defeated North Carolina for last year’s tournament championship.
”When I got to Miami,” Hurricanes second-year coach Jim Larranaga said, “I asked the players who are the best teams in the league and they said Duke and North Carolina, so what we have tried to do is use them as a shining example of how things can be done… I think we’ve got a lot of very, very good teams who haven’t won as many championships, but they’re also very, very competitive in the league. There is a lot of great, young players in this conference right now, and it could be any of those teams sitting here next year at this time.”
The ACC has a different champion for the third straight season - Duke won the 2011 title - and all have come at the expense of the Tar Heels. The Tar Heels’ latest attempt to win their first crown since 2008 was a classic as both teams took long-distance punches at one another. The two teams combined for 25 3-point ﬁeld goals, setting a new championship game record and tying the overall tournament record.
The Tar Heels led 67-64 on a basket by P.J. Hairston with 7:44 to play. A 3-point field goal from Trey McKinney-Jones with 6:27 to play gave the Hurricanes, who are 5-18 all-time against UNC after their third win over the Tar Heels this season, the lead for good with 6:27 to play. Julian Gamble scored five points in run that gave the Hurricanes breathing room.
The Tar Heels pulled to within 74-71 on a basket by Marcus Paige with 3:37 to play, but tournament most valuable player Shane Larkin hit a basket and after a UNC turnover, McKinney-Jones nailed a 3-pointer with 1:36 left for a 79-71 lead. UNC never got any closer.
“They won the regular season, and then validated it by winning a conference tournament as well and it’s just a great, great year for them,” UNC coach Roy Williams said of Miami after the Tar Heels became just the second team - joining Maryland - to lose three straight title games. “They’re a really big-time basketball team. Shane Larkin is hard to handle out top, he’s phenomenal, he really is. He’s probably the most effective player in our league. He just does so much to help their team and puts pressure on the other team. Everybody knows their roles, they take what role they have and they do a great job with it.”
Williams was in search of win No. 700. his second attempt for that milestone will come in the second round of the NCAA Tournament later this week.
Larkin, who finished with 28 points, McKinney-Jones, who had 20 and Rion Brown, who added 12 big points, all hit crucial shots in the second half as the Hurricanes hit 12 of 22 shots from beyond the arc for 54.5 percent, tied for the sixth best championship game performance. The 12 made 3-pointers is a program tournament record and is tied for the third-most in championship history.
“A lot of people are saying we peeked early in the year when we won 14 games in a row and we dropped three out of our last ﬁve,” Larkin said. “So a lot of people said we peaked too early, we weren’t going to have any chance in the tournament. But we stayed together as a group and stayed together and believed in ourselves and came out here and got three wins in a row against three very tough teams.”
Miami dusted off Boston College in the opening round and a North Carolina State that is playing very well in the semifinals.
UNC’s P.J. Hairston, who received eight stitches in his left hand Friday night after suffering a laceration to the webbing between his ring finger and middle finger, scored 28 points for the Tar Heels (24-10). Hairston hit 6 0f 13 from 3-point range as the Tar Heels’ 13 long-distance makes are the second highest in an ACC championship game and the highest in a title game in regulation. Wake Forest holds the record with 15 in an overtime win over the Tar Heels in 1995. Hairston did extend his streak of games with at least one 3-pointer to an ACC-best 31.
“I got nothing to complain about with my team today,” Williams said. “I’m really proud of my team. I’m not talking about the entire year, I’m talking about today. Unbelievably proud of what they have accomplished and how far they have come when everybody was abandoning ship earlier. I’m really proud of my team, and the way they played today.”
Despite the loss, UNC players said they made a good showing, especially considering the 87-61 whipping the Hurricanes put on them back on Feb. 9.
“Watching the film last night on the game at Miami, really probably helped our mindset because you watch that and you take it personal when you see them throwing the ball at the backboard and dunking it and getting wild with shots and high-ﬁving during the game,”Reggie Bullock said. “So we just wanted to come out with the mindset that we’re a better team than we showed last time, and we had a really great opportunity to earn a ring and win an ACC Tournament championship. And they probably outplayed us for the last 5 or 6 minutes of the game, but other than that, it was a dogfight.”
The first half was one of the most entertaining halves in quite awhile. Miami and North Carolina combined for 10 ties and 15 lead changes. They exchanged the lead eight times in a span of 3:09 in the ﬁrst half.