After losing to Duke on Saturday night, North Carolina’s NCAA Tournament hopes took a big hit. The Tar Heels were already on the wrong side of the bubble going into this game.
And now, they are hanging on by a thread.
North Carolina ideally has to win four games in four days next week to make the NCAA Tournament. Getting 3 wins could get the job done depending on what other bubble teams do. While UNC fell four spots in Joe Lunardi’s bracketology, CBS Sports’ Jerry Palm doesn’t think the Tar Heels chances are gone just yet.
Palm updated his mock bracket and still has UNC as a ‘first four out’ team which is a little surprising. He also revealed what he thinks UNC has to do and it’s winning just one Quad 1 game to have a chance:
With hope dwindling even more after the Duke loss, North Carolina needs at least one more Quad 1 win to have a chance for an at-large bid. The good news is that the conference tournament is played on a neutral court, which means that the standard for opponents to qualify as Quad 1 is top 50 of the NET. As of Saturday morning, Miami and NC State would join Virginia and Duke as Quad 1 opponents on a neutral court, so the Tar Heels may have more opportunities ahead. The first one will not come before the ACC quarterfinal, though, so some early work needs to be done.
Now, that game would be against Virginia. A team that UNC went 1-1 against and lost in Charlottesville without Pete Nance and Armando Bacot. Getting another Quad 1 game which would likely come Friday would be huge as well.
Many think the Tar Heels have to win out, which could be the case but it’s interesting to hear another point of view.
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