Zack Austin scored 10 of his 15 points in the second half and hit the go-ahead 3-pointer with 2:35 remaining as Pittsburgh executed down the stretch and earned a 73-65 victory over visiting North Carolina on Tuesday night.
Austin made 5 of 7 shots and none were bigger than his triple with 2:35 left that gave the Panthers (14-6, 5-4 ACC) a 67-65 lead. Austin’s third 3-pointer of the contest came a little over two minutes after he hit a triple with 4:41 left to give Pittsburgh a 64-63 lead and ended a drought of nearly seven minutes without a basket.
Austin also collected five blocks, including one when he blocked a 3-point try by Elliott Cadeau out of bounds with 41 seconds to go to protect a four-point lead.
Jaland Lowe led the Panthers with 18 points and scored 15 by halftime to help the Panthers overcome a 10-point deficit. Ishmael Leggett added 15 and Cameron Corhen chipped in 14 as the Panthers shot 43.6 percent and ended the game with a 14-2 run over the final 5:33 and scored the game’s final nine points.
RJ Davis scored 16 points for North Carolina (13-9, 6-4), which shot 44.1 percent overall but made only 31 percent of its shots in the final 20 minutes. Cadeau added 11 points but was in foul trouble, while Seth Trimble shot 3-for-14 and wound up with 10 points and 12 rebounds.
The Tar Heels opened a seven-point lead about six minutes in and held a 38-30 lead with 4:34 left after Drake Powell and Davis sank 3-pointers. The lead grew to 44-34 on a hook shot by Ven-Allen Lubin but the Panthers ended the half with eight straight points over the final 2:11 to get within 44-42 by halftime.
Trimble’s layup gave the Tar Heels a 49-42 edge and forced the Panthers to burn a timeout 94 seconds into the second half. Coming out of the timeout, Pittsburgh scored eight straight for a 50-49 lead on a 3 by Damian Dunn with 15:39 left and took a 55-52 lead on a 3 by Guillermo Diaz-Graham with 11:37 remaining.
North Carolina went ahead again when Davis sank a deep 3 with 9:01 remaining to make it 59-57. Cadeau gave the Tar Heels a 65-64 lead on a layup with 3:21 left but North Carolina missed its final seven shots.
–Field Level Media
