March Madness – (4) UNC vs. (1) Wisconsin

(4) North Carolina Tar Heels vs. (1) Wisconsin Badgers (-5.5, 141.5 o/u)

The No. 4 North Carolina Tar Heels (26-11, 11-7 ACC) are a perennial basketball power that has fallen on relatively hard times of late, failing to reach the second week of March Madness in the last three seasons. But this year, UNC head coach Roy Williams will be back in familiar territory, as his team roars into the Sweet 16 on the heels of a convincing 87-78 win over No. 5 Arkansas.

To get any farther, UNC will have to take down the No. 1 Wisconsin Badgers (33-3, 16-2 Big Ten) on Thursday at the STAPLES Center in Los Angeles (7:47 PM Eastern).

After narrowly edging No. 13 Harvard in the Round of 64, UNC looked much better against Arkansas, using a big second half to cover the 4.5-point spread.

While the team should be feeling confident after downing the Razorbacks, there is cause for concern. The team probably will be without post player Kennedy Meeks, who’s dealing with a knee injury.

“They’re not completely ruling him out, and they’re not saying that he can play,” said coach Williams. “Let me say it that way – I don’t think we’ll have him, but we’ll just have to wait and see. … I don’t expect that we’ll know anything unless something really bad came out, for the next couple days. If he doesn’t practice [Monday], he could still play. If he doesn’t practice Wednesday, it’d be hard to play on Thursday.”

The Badgers, meanwhile, have a No. 1 next to their name, but they have yet to play like a top team in the tourney.  They beat No. 16 Coastal Carolina, 86-72, but they let the Chanticleers hang around longer than they should have and failed to cover the 19.5-point spread. In the Round of 32, they again failed to cover as double-digit favorites, beating Oregon 72-65.

The Badgers aren’t going to complain about being in the Sweet 16, but they also know they have a lot of work ahead of them.

“We’re definitely excited and thrilled to be there, but we’re not as in awe or shocked as we were last year,” Wisconsin player Nigel Hayes said. “Last year, we were jumping around up and down on the court, celebrating. This time, it was ‘Hoo-rah, good job guys. We have the next game to take care of.'”

The two times these programs met in both 2005 and 2011, with the Tar Heels taking both games SU and ATS. The presence or absence of Meeks (11.6 PPG, 7.4) could prove the difference between a third-straight ATS win for the Heels and a Wisconsin rout.

(Photo credit: U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class David Danals [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons. Photo has been cropped.)