Duke-UNC prediction: Why Coach K’s team will beat North Carolina in the Final Four
Why Duke will win: Duke has the best player on the floor in freshman Paolo Banchero and far more NBA-ready talent than UNC does. The Blue Devils start four players — Banchero, Mark Williams, AJ Griffin and Wendell Moore Jr. — who are all projected first-round picks in the 2022 draft. UNC doesn’t have any, according to most projections.
It all connects through Banchero, the precocious freshman who is averaging 18.5 points, 7.0 rebounds and 3.8 assists per game in the NCAA tournament and may be the No. 1 overall NBA draft pick in June.
Although the Blue Devils are younger than UNC, they have a massive advantage in coaching experience. This is Coach Mike Krzyzewski’s 13th Final Four, and five of those have ended in national championships. On the other hand, it is Hubert Davis’s first-ever season coaching UNC.
Duke would be well-served taking the ball directly at UNC’s Armando Bacot early and repeatedly. If Bacot can be lured into foul trouble, as he was in the first Duke-UNC matchup, the Blue Devils will have little to worry about inside and can concentrate on stopping UNC’s array of three-point shooters. Duke is also deeper than the Tar Heels, who played all five of their starters all 20 minutes in the second Duke-UNC game this year (the two teams split their matchups, with each winning on the road).
The X factor for Duke is Jeremy Roach, the point guard who has re-emerged at just the right time and was so instrumental in the Texas Tech victory.
Why Duke won’t win: If Williams gets flummoxed and badly out-rebounded by Bacot inside, that would hurt. If Banchero gets tentative and stops being the confident and aggressive player he’s been throughout the NCAA Tournament, that would hurt. If Griffin and Moore, Duke’s two 40 percent-plus 3-point shooters in the starting lineup, go ice-cold, that would hurt. Lastly, Duke can’t get on the wrong end of one of Caleb Love’s shooting streaks.
This story was originally published April 1, 2022 at 6:00 AM.
