Sunday, November 12
Chapel Hill, N.C.
2:00 PM
Lehigh University
0-3,0-0Patriot
68
at
90
University of North Carolina
2-0,0-0ACC
1
2
F
Lehigh
34
34
68
North Carolina
43
47
90
Photo by: Andy Mead
Lehigh Bested 90-68 By #19 North Carolina
11/12/2023 6:43:00 PM | Men's Basketball
CHAPEL HILL, N.C. – Less than 48 hours after playing toe-to-toe against the Penn State Nittany Lions, Lehigh men's basketball tipped off against the #19 North Carolina Tarheels at the Dean E. Smith Center on Sunday afternoon. After trailing by nine points at half and cutting UNC's lead to three in the second half, the Mountain Hawks fell by a score of 90-68.
"Our goal was to close it to single digits going into the half and I felt like we accomplished that," said head coach Dr. Brett Reed. "I felt like we were competitive. Unfortunately, we just couldn't sustain enough against a really good ACC team."
Sunday's game was only the second time that Lehigh and UNC have squared off, with the first coming all the way back in the 1940-41 season.
Lehigh (0-3) gave UNC (2-0) a challenge to begin the game, as the lead changed hands six times in the opening stanza. Lehigh's 39% from the field bested UNC's 33% and the Mountain Hawks shot a higher percentage from three in the frame. Junior Keith Higgins Jr. posted 14 points in the first half, which included a leaning jumper to cut the lead to 43-34 as time expired.
The Mountain Hawks continued to play with the perennial powerhouse well into the second half. After UNC extended their lead to ten, a 7-0 run and Tyler Whitney-Sidney bucket set the score at 53-50 with 13:25 left to go in the game.
The Tar Heels found great contributions from their two Naismith Player of the Year Watch List members in Armando Bacot and RJ Davis, who each posted 22 points respectively. Bacot's presence on the glass helped UNC tremendously, as he accounted for 20 of Carolina's 52 rebounds. In addition, the Tar Heels shot 19 of their 28 free throws in the second half compared to Lehigh's four total in the game, which proved to make a huge difference.
Lehigh's 39.4% three-point shooting percentage is the highest mark the Mountain Hawks have shot from outside the arc this season. Nine different players combined to hit 13 triples for Lehigh in the loss.
All 16 players recorded minutes for the Mountain Hawks in Sunday's loss. Senior Burke Chebuhar played a career-high 17 minutes in the game, knocking down two triples off the bench in the process.
"I thought [Burke's minutes] were really valuable and meaningful minutes for us," said Reed. "Tonight's matchups weren't quite the same [as the first two games], and it called for us to put Burke out there for a few more minutes. He's got skill, shoots the ball well… It was good to be able to reward him on a pretty big stage."
First-year Cam Gillus followed up his season-debut on Friday with an impressive performance on Sunday, shooting 3/3 from the field to record eight points. First-years Nasir Whitlock and Joshua Ingram each tallied 13 minutes as well.
"That's what we're looking for, these young guys to come in, play really hard, compliment, and even spell some of our existing guys," said Reed. "There were times where we were trying to find what could spark us… Baskets were hard to come by and defensive stops against a team as talented as Carolina, certainly hard as well."
After a busy weekend road trip, Lehigh will have a few days of rest before returning to action from Stabler Arena on Thursday. The Mountain Hawks will play host to Oneonta at 7 p.m. in Bethlehem.
"We know that we've got to go about a certain business of basketball to allow us to be successful," said Reed. "I thought our kids, despite some adversity particularly in the first half, were able to pull together."
Like Lehigh men's basketball on Facebook, follow on X (formerly Twitter) and Instagram for continued updates on the Mountain Hawks.
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"Our goal was to close it to single digits going into the half and I felt like we accomplished that," said head coach Dr. Brett Reed. "I felt like we were competitive. Unfortunately, we just couldn't sustain enough against a really good ACC team."
Sunday's game was only the second time that Lehigh and UNC have squared off, with the first coming all the way back in the 1940-41 season.
Lehigh (0-3) gave UNC (2-0) a challenge to begin the game, as the lead changed hands six times in the opening stanza. Lehigh's 39% from the field bested UNC's 33% and the Mountain Hawks shot a higher percentage from three in the frame. Junior Keith Higgins Jr. posted 14 points in the first half, which included a leaning jumper to cut the lead to 43-34 as time expired.
The Mountain Hawks continued to play with the perennial powerhouse well into the second half. After UNC extended their lead to ten, a 7-0 run and Tyler Whitney-Sidney bucket set the score at 53-50 with 13:25 left to go in the game.
The Tar Heels found great contributions from their two Naismith Player of the Year Watch List members in Armando Bacot and RJ Davis, who each posted 22 points respectively. Bacot's presence on the glass helped UNC tremendously, as he accounted for 20 of Carolina's 52 rebounds. In addition, the Tar Heels shot 19 of their 28 free throws in the second half compared to Lehigh's four total in the game, which proved to make a huge difference.
Lehigh's 39.4% three-point shooting percentage is the highest mark the Mountain Hawks have shot from outside the arc this season. Nine different players combined to hit 13 triples for Lehigh in the loss.
All 16 players recorded minutes for the Mountain Hawks in Sunday's loss. Senior Burke Chebuhar played a career-high 17 minutes in the game, knocking down two triples off the bench in the process.
"I thought [Burke's minutes] were really valuable and meaningful minutes for us," said Reed. "Tonight's matchups weren't quite the same [as the first two games], and it called for us to put Burke out there for a few more minutes. He's got skill, shoots the ball well… It was good to be able to reward him on a pretty big stage."
First-year Cam Gillus followed up his season-debut on Friday with an impressive performance on Sunday, shooting 3/3 from the field to record eight points. First-years Nasir Whitlock and Joshua Ingram each tallied 13 minutes as well.
"That's what we're looking for, these young guys to come in, play really hard, compliment, and even spell some of our existing guys," said Reed. "There were times where we were trying to find what could spark us… Baskets were hard to come by and defensive stops against a team as talented as Carolina, certainly hard as well."
After a busy weekend road trip, Lehigh will have a few days of rest before returning to action from Stabler Arena on Thursday. The Mountain Hawks will play host to Oneonta at 7 p.m. in Bethlehem.
"We know that we've got to go about a certain business of basketball to allow us to be successful," said Reed. "I thought our kids, despite some adversity particularly in the first half, were able to pull together."
Like Lehigh men's basketball on Facebook, follow on X (formerly Twitter) and Instagram for continued updates on the Mountain Hawks.
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Team Stats
Lehigh
UNC
FG%
.366
.463
3FG%
.394
.294
FT%
.750
.821
RB
31
52
TO
11
10
STL
7
9
Game Leaders
Scoring
Pts
16
FGM
7
3FGM
2
FTM
0
Pts
10
FGM
4
3FGM
2
FTM
0
Pts
8
FGM
3
3FGM
2
FTM
0
Pts
7
FGM
3
3FGM
1
FTM
0
Players Mentioned
F
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