The unranked Terrier basketball team took on #8 University of North Carolina Tar Heels in front of an electric and packed Jerry Richardson Indoor Stadium. Despite the 78-67 loss, the Terriers held their own against the Tar Heels. Fletcher Magee led the team with 21 points, Cam Jackson added 10 points, 9 rebounds and 2 steals and Storm Murphy also finished with 15 points, 6 assists and 2 rebounds. For the Tar Heels, Luke Maye led the way with 24 points, 7 rebounds and 4 assists, Cameron Johnson added 17 points, 8 rebounds, 2 assists and 2 steals and Garrison Brooks added 20 points and 5 rebounds.
The game itself was a back and forth affair, with the score even being tied at 46 with just 10:36 to go, but a demoralizing run through good defense locked the Terriers out of the game, making a comeback monumentally difficult. The game was impressively, but by no means fully, polished for a first game of the season. There were only 23 turnovers in the game, and only 9 by Wofford, something Coach Young calls “A winning line.” At the same time, however, neither team really settled into a rhythm until about halfway through the first half, best exemplified by Wofford’s 12-35 in the first half, including just 2-16 from beyond the arc.
The Terriers of course put up a valiant fight, and Coach Young knows this. In his opening statement of the press conference, he said “I thought (our effort) was awesome. You win or you learn, and we will definitely learn a lot from that. I just told them, there is nothing I’m going to see on that film in terms of effort and willingness to do the right thing and to make the right play that I’ll want to correct.” The effort was the story of the game according to both coaches, as Coach Roy Williams and Coach Young both feel the most valuable player to each of their respective teams were players who combined for zero points.
On UNC’s team, that player was Kenny Williams. Coach Williams said, “He’s a senior, didn’t score… 0-3, 6 rebounds, 5 assists, 3 turnovers, and he chased Fletcher. All. Night. Long… and he [Fletcher] is one of the best shooters I’ve ever seen from unorthodox positions. After he [Kenny] hurt his shoulder and I put him back in, the first thing he does is dive into the stands over there, and the first thing he did was check the lady he dove on to see if she was okay.” Coach Young also added in his press conference that Williams is “terrific.”
For Wofford, the star player was Keve Aluma. Said Young, “He’s got really good hands, and I think he’s a little too unselfish at times…I’m proud of him. I thought he played really hard, and did a nice job for us. He’s good at batting that thing out there if you can’t get it, just swatting it back to the top of the floor.”
The Terriers have played four games between the date this article was written and the date of its publication. They travelled to High Point on Nov. 10, and played Carver College at home on the 13. They then played two huge road games against Stanford and Oklahoma. The stats and scores for all of those games can be found at woffordterriers.com. The Terriers also play tomorrow at home against Chopin State University.
Photo Caption: Fletcher Magee shooting over North Carolina’s Kenny Williams
