NEW YORK — The chants of “over-rated!” began with about three minutes left Friday night at Madison Square Garden. Frankly, they could have begun sooner.
Sixth-ranked North Carolina could barely bury a second-half shot, struggled to make second-half stops, and fell to unranked Syracuse 87-71 in the championship game of the 2K Sports Classic.
“They’re not the national championship team,” Orange coach Jim Boeheim reminded everyone (twice) after Syracuse shot 54.4 percent for the game.
“We got our tails beat by a very good basketball team,” Tar Heels coach Roy Williams said. “The second half is about as bad as you can play—we hope.”
North Carolina (4-1) led 39-37 at halftime, but Syracuse (4-0) opened the second half with a 22-1 run that gave it a 59-40 lead. It was a snowball effect: A Tar Heel would throw up an airball; Syracuse would score. A Tar Heel would turn it over, Syracuse would score, again. In all, UNC missed its first 13 shots of the half and turned it over five times before Tyler Zeller buried his team’s first field goal, a short jumper with 12:02 left.
