UNC Basketball: Armando Bacot has harsh, yet true words following loss at Notre Dame

There has been a common theme in the four losses for the UNC basketball program so far this year. Effort.

The Tar Heels entered Wednesday’s game on the road at Notre Dame with a 10-3 record overall and a 2-0 record in Atlantic Coast Conference play. Now, road games in the conference are no easy task and UNC has played three straight now before their home opener on Saturday.

But that’s no excuse especially against a Fighting Irish team that you should beat.

In North Carolina’s three losses prior to Wednesday, the Tar Heels were lacking effort in certain areas against Purdue, Tennessee, and Kentucky. That showed up again in South Bend especially on the defensive side of the floor. Notre Dame’s game plan was simple. They were going to exploit UNC’s defense, specifically switching assignments, and they were going to take advantage of open looks at the three-point line.

The Fighting Irish finished the game making 13 of their 31 attempts from the three-point line with a good amount of those being open looks. The Tar Heels weren’t getting their switches right and when they did, they were late out there to get a hand up.

Following the game, Armando Bacot who finished with 21 points and 17 rebounds, had a harsh, yet true quote about the game for UNC.

"“It was just flat out an embarrassing loss today,” Bacot said via Inside Carolina. “All of (the losses) hurt,” Bacot said when asked to compare the loss to Notre Dame to previous losses to Kentucky and Tennessee. “I don’t know, I just want to figure it out. It is just bad. I just feel bad and sorry for the fans, former coaches, former players. It is unacceptable that we can’t win these games with all the talent that we have. It is unacceptable that we’re not paying attention to our coaches and just not playing Carolina basketball in those games specifically. Going further into the season we’ve got to be more consistent in every game and we can’t be good in some games and not good in others. We’ll figure it out.”"

The good news? There’s time to figure it out and at least someone is pointing out what is wrong with the team right now. The bad news? This has happened four times too many this season and it’s not the first time the effort or anything like that was questioned.

This is a talented North Carolina team led by Bacot, R.J. Davis, and Caleb Love. But even with multiple four and five-star players, if the effort isn’t there especially on the defensive end of the floor. This has been a problem for years now in terms of guarding the perimeter and it continues to spill over into the next season.

UNC does welcome in Virginia on Saturday as the Cavaliers are one of the worst three-point shooting teams in the country at No. 257 overall, making 31.7 percent of their attempts.

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