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Following its 86-81 win over then-No. 13 Notre Dame on Sunday, Syracuse moved to No. 25 in the AP Poll for the first time under head coach Felisha Legette-Jack. Looking to extend their winning streak to nine games, the Orange faced a new challenge: their first road conference game of the season.

UNC, despite winning three straight, was knocked out of the AP Poll for the first time this season. Thursday’s contest was a test to see if SU is a legitimate contender. It was also the Orange’s first true road game against a Power Five school since they lost 83-81 to then-No. 20 Maryland on Nov. 19.

While the Orange’s win against Notre Dame showed the program is rapidly turning around under Legette-Jack, Thursday’s performance showed they still have more to figure out before becoming a premiere Atlantic Coast Conference team. No. 25 Syracuse (11-2, 1-1 ACC) lost 75-51 to North Carolina (10-4, 2-0 ACC), spearheaded by guard Alyssa Ustby, who registered the first triple-double (16 points, 10 assists and 16 rebounds) in program history. Meanwhile, the Orange shot a season-low 29.6 percent from the field en route to their lowest-scoring total of the season.

“We want to beat a top-25 team — that’s a spot that we want to be in,” Ustby said. “We want to be ranked and we know that we deserve to be ranked, so we had to prove it.”

The Tar Heels set their offensive tone early by getting into the paint with ease in the opening minutes. Ustby, a 6-foot-1 senior guard capable of playing the 1-through-5, opened up the scoring with a contested left-handed layup,. In the opening quarter, Ustby registered four assists and five rebounds too.

While Ustby was doing the little things, forward Maria Gakdeng dominated down low, scoring 11 of her game-high 22 points in the opening period. With the Tar Heels — who are efficient from 2-point range but entered the contest 269th in Division I from distance — winning down low, the Orange attempted seven 3-pointers in the opening frame but only made two of them, creating a 19-14 deficit.

“Coming into this game knowing their post-presence wasn’t as good as ours, I knew what I needed to do,” Gakdeng said.

Opening the second quarter, UNC graduate transfer Lexi Donarski’s impact was immediately felt. Throughout the first, Donarski, the 2021-22 Big 12 Defensive Player of the Year, primarily guarded SU’s leading scorer Dyaisha Fair. Donarski helped hold the Orange scoreless for a four-and-a-half minute stretch and drained her second 3-pointer of the game on the other end, giving UNC a 24-14 lead two minutes into the second.

The Orange chipped away over the next few minutes, cutting North Carolina’s lead to 26-20, but Ustby proceeded to shred their defense. With Syracuse’s defense concerned with Gakdeng — who scored 20 points against the Orange last season while at Boston College — down low, it switched to a zone defense.

This allowed Ustby to penetrate the lane which left Paulina Paris open behind the arc, who drained her second 3-pointer. Fair responded with a 3 of her own, but Ustby again applied pressure on SU’s defense before dishing to Donarski for an easy layup and her 15th point of the game.

Despite having no answers for UNC’s offensive attack, Syracuse did a stellar job of slowing down Donarski, Ustby and company to close the first half. For the final 4:17 of the half, the Tar Heels were held without a field goal and only one point. The Orange took advantage, going on a 7-0 run to narrow their deficit to 32-30 entering halftime.

Though SU only trailed by two at halftime, it only shot 34.4% from the field while the Tar Heels shot 50.0%. The Orange were able to weather the storms of their inefficiencies in the first half, but not in the second.

North Carolina responded to the Orange’s late second quarter run with six consecutive points to start the third, jumpstarting a third quarter in which they outscored Syracuse 25-6. Throughout the third, Syracuse shot 3-for-19 from the field and missed all eight of its 3s. It was a period where Legette-Jack said everything went wrong for the Orange.

Fair and Georgia Woolley, SU’s leading scorers, shot a combined 1-for-10 in the period. The quarter was a strong representation of the veteran backcourt’s outing. Fair led the Orange with 17 points on an inefficient 7-of-22 shooting while Woolley scored a season-low 3 points making just one of her 10 shots.

With a minute left in the third, UNC grew its lead from two at the start of the quarter to 19. Looking to extend the Tar Heels’ lead, Ustby corralled the ball in the right corner before penetrating into the paint. Ustby missed her driving layup, but she was fouled by Alaina Rice. Ustby also missed her first attempt from the charity stripe but made the second, giving her 10 points to go along with her 13 assists and 13 rebounds, cementing the first triple-double in North Carolina women’s basketball history.

After their dreadful third, the Orange responded with just 15 points in the fourth, allowing the Tar Heels to jump out to a statement 24-point win.

“We just knocked them out of (the AP Poll) 25 and they wanted to prove that they’re better than us and they did a great job of doing that,” Legette-Jack said. “Hats off to the great team that’s here at North Carolina. We’re on our way. Because we lost today doesn’t mean that we not still coming, we still coming.”

Published on January 4, 2024 at 8:24 pm

Contact Justin: justingirshon@gmail.com | @JustinGirshon