Tar Heels no match for Eagles

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. -- This wasn't quite The Road to Glory. But it wasn't quite the Road to Perdition, either.

The Boston College men's basketball team last night came to the heart of Tobacco Road and took an important step on the road to redemption by equalizing its Atlantic Coast Conference record after an 0-3 start.

BC's first trip to Chapel Hill took a tragic turn Tuesday night when the charter bus carrying the team to a practice session at the Dean E. Smith Center struck and killed Harry Weldon Alston, a 39-year-old bicyclist from Carrboro, N.C.

''It was just like a shock. Everybody on the bus felt bad about it," said BC freshman guard Tyrese Rice. ''We were just in practice and everybody was looking around like, 'What are we supposed to be doing? A man just lost his life.' This was like bigger than basketball, but we just came out and had to play hard and use their energy to help us do more on the court."

The 20th-ranked Eagles (15-4, 3-3 ACC) overcame all manner of adversity -- on and off the court -- to deliver BC coach Al Skinner his 300th career triumph in an 81-74 triumph over the Tar Heels last night before a crowd of 21,015.

''It's a huge win for us," said Jared Dudley, who led five BC players in double figures with 17 points, to go along with 8 rebounds, 4 steals, and 2 assists. ''Coming in 0-3 in the league, people had counted us out. But we're going to win games. We just got to play our game."

The victory was BC's second consecutive conference road victory, following a 65-61 win at Miami Saturday.

''We're just at .500, so there's a lot more basketball to play," said Skinner, whose team will return to Conte Forum to play host to Georgia Tech Sunday at 5:30. ''Hopefully, we'll continue to play at the level we need to. There's no question we dug ourselves a hole and it's not like we're really out of the hole, but at least we're in the mix a little bit."

Last night, the Eagles led, 42-30, at halftime despite having Craig Smith (16 points, career-high 7 assists, and 5 rebounds) and Dudley combine for just 8 first-half points on 4-for-11 shooting from the field.

Facing a 24-15 deficit with 8:27 left in the first half, the Eagles were bolstered by the scoring of Rice, who had 11 of his 16 points in the first half, and junior forward Sean Marshall, who tallied all 11 of his points in the first. It helped fuel a decisive 27-6 run over the last 8:04 of the first half that seemed to take the starch out of the young and feisty Tar Heels, who lost four NBA lottery picks from last year's national championship squad.

''I told Al congratulations," said UNC coach Roy Williams, whose team (11-5, 3-3) got a game-high 26 points and 8 rebounds from 6-foot-9-inch freshman phenom Tyler Hansbrough.

''He's got a big-time club that made big-time plays when they had to make them. I'm very pleased with how our kids played and competed in the second half, but you don't stop somebody as good as Boston College with a 12-point lead."

''[The Eagles] played with a lot of poise," said UNC junior guard Wes Miller. ''Even when we got energy and started to get it going defensively and tried to cause a little havoc, they still played with poise."

The Tar Heels came out and halved BC's 12-point lead when David Noel followed a 3-point play by Hansbrough with a timely trey to pull UNC to 42-36. But the Eagles got it back to 46-36 when Akida McLain tallied on a layup and Smith followed with a strong low-post move.

''In the second half, I knew I would get it going. I knew it was going to be my time in crunch time," said Smith, who tallied 14 second-half points.

Hansbrough scored on another 3-point play off a strong clear-out move underneath to pull UNC to 48-41.

The Eagles, however, went on a 7-2 spurt to get it back to 12, 55-43, on McLain's backdoor dunk off Smith's crisp entry pass with 11:45 to go.

The Tar Heels had the Smith Center quaking when they pulled to 65-63 on a pair of foul shots by Reyshawn Terry (courtesy of Sean Williams's fifth personal) with 5:35 to go.

But the Eagles withstood that flurry to outscore the Tar Heels, 16-11, the rest of the way.