Winning Ugly: UNC Gets By Duke 86-72, Hansbrough Gets Bloody Nose In Final Seconds
Chapel Hill, NC (AHN) - As if this rivalry needed any more fuel to add to the fire, yesterday's 86-72 win by North Carolina over Duke got down right nasty in the end.
Tyler Hansbrough scored 26 points and grabbed 17 rebounds to lift the Tar Heels, but came out on the wrong end of a Gerald Henderson elbow and left the court with a bloody face with 14.5 seconds left to play after attempting a layup.
Hansbrough was escorted off the court and into the UNC locker room, visibly upset. Henderson was ejected after officials determined the foul on Henderson was intentional.
Under league rules, Henderson will also be forced to miss Duke's next game when it plays N.C. State in the ACC tournament.
"We'll take all responsibility, but if there's any way Gerald Henderson did that intentionally, it's crazy," Duke head coach Mike Krzyzewski said. "He's moving away from him, he's going up to block, he's not even seeing how he hit him. I feel badly for Tyler and we apologize for that, but I know there was no intent to do that."
Hansbrough did not speak to reporters after the game, but Roy Williams did say the injury wasn't as serious as it looked.
"It's not like a prize-fight where you ask what the other guy looks like," Williams said. "He looks pretty bad. They say it's not broken."
Reyshawn Terry scored 15 points in his final home game at the Dean E. Smith Center, and freshmen Tywon Lawson added 12 and Brendan Wright 10 for the Tar Heels, who wrapped up their regular season with a 25-6 overall record, and 11-5 in the ACC.
The win by the Tar Heels, combined with the loss of Virginia on Saturday to Wake Forest and Virginia Tech's loss to Clemson gave the UNC the No. 1 seed for this week's ACC tournament.
UNC had the game in control until an early second half run pulled Duke to within two points at 50-48 after Greg Paulus (20 points) made a jump shot.
Duke got the ball right back with a chance to tie or take the lead, but Paulus turned the ball over.
Marcus Ginyard scooped the ball up and started the fast break, finding Hansbrough for a layup and foul that turned into a three-point play.
That began an 18-4 run that helped build UNC's lead to 68-52 with just over five minutes left to play to seal the win.
"It was a great afternoon for us," Williams added. "You hate that it ended like it did, with the stuff going on, but, at the same time, we were very, very pleased and we also realize that we're very happy and very lucky. We got a lot of help the last week of the season."
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