Jaylen Blakes hit a step-back jumper with just over one second to go and visiting Stanford earned its first-ever win over North Carolina, 72-71, in Chapel Hill on Saturday.
With the teams changing leads five times over the final two minutes, Stanford (12-6, 4-3 Atlantic Coast Conference) trailed by one with 7.7 seconds to go. Off the inbounds pass, Blakes sprinted the length of the floor and buried a midrange jumper to put the Cardinal back on top.
North Carolina (12-7, 5-2) attempted a high-arcing pass out of a timeout, but it was knocked out of bounds to seal the win for Stanford, which entered 0-13 against UNC.
Maxime Raynaud led the Cardinal with 25 points and 13 rebounds for his nation-leading 15th double-double of the season. Blakes finished with 20 points and seven assists and Oziyah Sellers chipped in with 11 points.
For the Tar Heels, whose four-game winning streak came to an end, RJ Davis snapped out of a scoring funk with 19 points after totaling just 18 over the two previous games. Ven-Allen Lubin scored a season-high 13 and Elliot Cadeau added 12.
Ian Jackson, who had six 20-point outings in his previous seven games, finished with just six points on 1-of-8 shooting from the floor.
The game featured 14 lead changes and 12 ties with neither side building a lead larger than seven.
North Carolina appeared poised to break away in the first half, with Seth Trimble and Davis burying back-to-back 3-pointers to spark a 12-5 run for the Tar Heels en route to a 24-17 lead, its largest of the game.
Yet the Cardinal clawed back. And in the second half, Stanford seemed destined to pull away as buckets from Blakes and Sellers put the visitors in front 57-52 — its biggest lead.
Like their counterparts, though, the Tar Heels fought back and grabbed a 71-70 lead with 7.7 seconds to go on two Trimble free throws.
Blakes then went baseline to baseline, hitting the step-back jumper with 1.5 seconds to go and sending the Cardinal to their third victory in four games.
–Field Level Media
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