Kevin Gorman: Jeff Capel gets cutthroat against Carolina, as Pitt gets sweep to savor

Jeff Capel wasn’t aware of the last time the Pitt Panthers pulled off a regular-season sweep in conference play, claiming he hadn’t studied the program’s history well enough to know.

What the Pitt coach does know — perhaps better than any of his players could ever imagine — is the rarity of sweeping a blue-blood program such as North Carolina. Only Duke (three times), Georgia Tech and Miami have done it in the past decade.

And Pitt hadn’t swept anyone in ACC play in four years, since winning the season series against Syracuse in 2015-16.

North Carolina has been a nemesis since Capel’s days of playing at Duke, when his Blue Devils were swept in each of his first three seasons. Not even his 40-foot runner at the buzzer to send it to overtime could help Duke topple the Tar Heels.

The Panthers pounced for a 20-point halftime lead and a 66-52 runaway victory Saturday afternoon at Petersen Events Center, just 10 days after winning in Chapel Hill.

“That’s big time. Coach even said that’s rare. He can’t even say he did that, so that’s big,” Pitt sophomore point guard Xavier Johnson said before cracking a wide smile. “I can say I did it.”

Pitt did it with defense, pressuring the perimeter and clogging passing lanes to prevent the Tar Heels from using their size advantage with 6-foot-10 Armando Bacot and 6-9 Garrison Brooks against the smaller Panthers.

“We wanted to pressure them,” Capel said. “Part of post defense is pressuring the basketball. We’re not as big as they are up front, especially when they play those two bigs together, with the way that we play. But I thought our pressure could help combat that, and I thought we did a good job of that.”

Capel paused, allowing the absence of Cole Anthony affected his gameplan. The preseason pick for ACC freshman of the year, Anthony leads the Tar Heels in scoring at 19.1 points but has been out since mid-December after arthroscopic surgery to repair a partially torn meniscus in his right knee.

To say it’s crushing to Carolina is an understatement.

“Look, it also helps that they’re playing without their best player,” Capel said. “That helps, too. It just so happens to be a point guard. I think if you take the starting point guard away from any team in college basketball, there’s going to be a big adjustment. That’s something we were cognizant of . We wanted to attack it.”

Call him cutthroat, but Capel went for the jugular.

Perhaps he remembers those losses from his Duke days. Maybe it was the way Carolina, with three NBA first-round picks, cruised to an 85-60 victory at the Pete last season. Or maybe he just wants bragging rights over his brother, Jason, a Pitt assistant who at played at Carolina.

It started with a conversation with Johnson, who is not only Pitt’s most dynamic player but oftentimes its most erratic. Capel reminded Johnson he was the Panthers’ best on-the-ball defender last season and demanded he play defense with as much passion as he shows on offense.

“That’s what I tried to do today,” Johnson said, “and you see the results.”

Johnson smiled again, letting the numbers do the talking for him. Pitt forced 11 Carolina turnovers in the first half, and scored 18 points off those turnovers. The defense created for the offense, especially as Pitt shot 50% in the first half before Ryan Murphy launched a 3-pointer at the buzzer.

“Their defense dominated our offense,” North Carolina coach Roy Williams said. “And our defense couldn’t come up with enough stops to get much going.”

Williams dwelled on how the Tar Heels needed to feel their pivot foot, how they needed to “handle some heat in a crowd,” how the turnovers set them so far back they couldn’t recover.

“They put us back on our heels,” Williams said. “We never could get back to where we had a chance.”

Never was that more evident than when Pitt used a 12-0 run for a 26-10 advantage. Murphy stripped Justin Pierce and fed a pass to Johnson, who raced down the floor and fed it to Murphy for a 3-pointer. After a timeout, Murphy hit another 3.

You got the feeling from Williams that he’s going to have nightmares about watching No. 24 square up for open shots from beyond the arc.

Pitt’s frenetic pace might keep him up at night, even when the Panthers couldn’t score. In one sequence, Johnson got a steal and put on a ball-handling clinic, using a stutter-step to set up a between-the-legs dribble before missing a runner. But then he got his own rebound to keep possession.

Trey McGowens missed a leaner in the lane but got his own rebound and fed Champagnie, who missed another 3. Then Johnson got a steal and fed Toney for yet another 3-point miss. Eric Hamilton got the offensive rebound and was fouled, making both shots for a 26-10 lead with 8:34 left in the half.

North Carolina didn’t just go 5:26 between field goals. It actually went two minutes without even crossing half-court with the basketball. That left the Tar Heels drained and defeated.

“The really good teams, they’re able to impose their will on the game,” Capel said. “Whether it’s defensively, whether they’re dominant on the offensive glass — some teams have potent offenses — so when you can do that and you can play with that spirit and that energy, it certainly does.

“Especially when you’re at home, because you can feed off it.”

Pitt has a long way to go to become a really good team, but the Panthers fed off their defense and found the spirit and energy to put North Carolina on its Tar Heels for a sweep to savor.

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