Duke Deals Major Blow to UNC Bubble Hopes With Narrow Road Win

The Blue Devils used a few key possessions late to edge the Tar Heels and put UNC’s tournament hopes in doubt.

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. (AP) — Kyle Filipowski had 22 points and 13 rebounds and Duke pulled out a 62–57 win over North Carolina in their regular-season finale on Saturday.

The Blue Devils (23–8, 14–6), won their sixth straight game and clinched a double-bye in the ACC Tournament that begins Tuesday in Greensboro, N.C. UNC (19–12, 11–9) will be the seventh seed.

Filipowski’s double-double was the 14th for the freshman. Tyrese Proctor added 13 points and Jeremy Roach and Mark Mitchell 10 apiece.

Armando Bacot had 17 points and 11 rebounds for his 68th career double-double. With 1,795 points, he passed Michael Jordan (1,788) for 14th on UNC’s career scoring list. RJ Davis also scored 17 points and Caleb Love had 11.

There were eight lead changes and four ties over the final nine minutes starting when UNC claimed its first lead since early on with a Davis 3-pointer that made it 46–45.

Filipowski gave Duke its final lead with two free throws at 1:38 and Roach made it a three-point edge on a drive with 48 seconds left. Davis couldn’t convert on a drive and Duke got the ball on a foul during a struggle for the rebound. Filipowski couldn’t make the one-and-one but Love missed a 3-pointer and Filipowski iced the game with a layup after Dereck Lively II cleared the rebound.

UNC didn’t have a field goal over the first six minutes of the second half as Duke, which led 33–31 at halftime, took the game’s largest lead of seven.

Duke shot 38% to 30% for UNC, which made just 5 of 23 from the arc and was outscored 30–16 in the paint.

Duke got its first regular-season sweep of UNC since 2019–20.