North Carolina basketball weathers unexpected Syracuse test, thanks to Jae’Lyn Withers
When things got tense, when the Clemson debacle started to loom large in the rear-view mirror, when the double-digit lead was gone and North Carolina was staring defeat in the dome in the face, one man stepped up to intervene.
Jae’Lyn Withers, of course.
Why not?
Never mind he’d played six minutes or fewer in four of North Carolina’s previous seven games, scoring a total of 21 points over that span. Never mind he had a quiet five points in an uneven first half. Never mind he got poked in the right eye by Cade Tyson in practice on Friday and was unsure whether he’d even play Saturday, right up until tip.
North Carolina tried to give it all away, and Withers went and grabbed it back. His personal 8-0 run gave the Tar Heels a nine-point lead the Tar Heels milked to the finish of an 88-82 win that wasn’t so much desperately needed as it was a loss they absolutely couldn’t afford.
“A little scratch on the eye isn’t going to stop him,” teammate Ian Jackson said. “He did a great job tonight, even with half an eye.”
Withers’ 19 points were his most in a North Carolina uniform, and only one off his career-high at Louisville in 2022, his first double-digit night since Thanksgiving. After making his second and third 3-pointers of the night early in the second half, there was even a sighting of the elusive Jae’Lyn Withers Heat Check, like spotting a meteor, before he fouled out with 1:45 to play.
With the Tar Heels going back to a slightly bigger lineup to match up better with Syracuse, opportunity presented itself to Withers, and he took advantage — even after he wasn’t sure he’d play at all.
“It was kind of a game-time decision,” Withers said. “I had some medicated drops which I guess helped with the healing process. Got a lot of rest last night and that kind of helped me make a decision. It was bad. We’re healing up. It was a lot worse yesterday.”
When it wasn’t Withers, it was another recent afterthought, Jackson, pulling the Tar Heels through. Jackson had 16 in the first half on his way to 23, the freshman’s most points in six weeks and more than he’d scored in the four games prior.
But when a season goes sideways and everything seems to be fraying at the seams, it can take the unexpected and unlikely contributions from someone like Withers to turn things around, or at least keep things from getting any worse.
If things had gotten to the point where the Tar Heels were pointing fingers at each other, they at least made it productive.
“I’m going to poke him in the eye Monday,” UNC coach Hubert Davis said. “It’s on the practice plan, first thing we’re going to do.”
Because sometimes, all you can do is to do no harm. In this case, that took the form of not losing to a bad Syracuse team that just gave up 91 points in a loss to woeful Miami, and after North Carolina was both embarrassed by Clemson and embarrassed itself against Clemson, losing by 20 with the memory of being down 40-13 at Duke not far behind, trying to avoid losing on the road for the fifth straight game.
North Carolina couldn’t play its way back into NCAA tournament contention Saturday — the Tar Heels would likely have to win out, up to and including the finale against Duke, just to be in the conversation — but it could make a disappointing season even worse.
“Just knowing what’s at stake, we did a good job keeping our composure today,” R.J. Davis said. “We didn’t get too radical and we didn’t let the game momentum favor their side. They made a run, and we came together as a team.”
This shouldn’t have been a test of North Carolina’s gumption, not against Syracuse, but it became one in the second half. The Tar Heels led by 11 early in the second half, and gave it away. They led by 10 with less than four minutes to go, and found themselves in a one-possession game in the final minute — and did everything right from there.
“I wasn’t happy with them coming back, because that’s something we’ve struggled with all season, is getting a lead, whether that’s in the first or second half, and letting a team come back,” Hubert Davis said. “Whether it’s turnovers, offensive rebounds, tonight it was a combination of both plus putting them on the free throw line. But I was really happy with the response, being on the road, them cutting it to two, one-possession game, being able to execute and get stops was big-time for our group.”
Maybe seeing out this win, doing what it took to hold on as Syracuse threw everything at them, is what the Tar Heels needed. Or maybe they just needed someone like Withers to step to the fore and say, not tonight. Whatever happened before, or whatever may happen next, it won’t happen this time. And didn’t.
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This story was originally published February 15, 2025 at 9:31 PM with the headline "North Carolina basketball weathers unexpected Syracuse test, thanks to Jae’Lyn Withers."
