At this point, the North Carolina Tar Heels are probably the presumptive favorites to win it all. The team that finished runner-up to Villanova last year brought back most of its rotation this season and played solid basketball throughout the season. The one hiccup was their inability to beat Duke, but now that the Blue Devils have been eliminated, that threat has vanished. It’s on Roy Williams and his boys to take care of business the rest of the way if they wish to avenge last year’s defeat and that path continues when they take on the Butler Bulldogs.
Don't miss this Sweet 16 showdown from FedEx Forum in Memphis at 7:09 p.m. ET on Friday. Catch every moment of the game live on CBS.
Sweet 16 Odds at BookMaker.eu
Tar Heels -7
Bulldogs +7
Over/Under 152.5
Odds Analysis
The current line at BookMaker is consistent with the opening line, but at other shops the line has already started to change. North Carolina is laying 7.5 with a total of 153 at other places and while lines that high typically go down closer to tipoff, this one could go up with the advantages that UNC has over Butler.
How They Got Here
UNC was given a No. 1 seed by virtue of winning the ACC in the regular season, but that feat isn’t looking so good now with the demise of all other conference counterparts in the first weekend of action. The Tar Heels are the second-biggest favorites to make it to the Elite Eight though and it’s almost unfathomable to imagine the ACC totally shut out of the final eight teams.
The Tar Heels are in this spot after routing and easily covering against Texas Southern and following that up with a hard-fought win over Arkansas. The Razorbacks led this one 65-60 with 3:43 left after erasing a 17-point deficit and UNC looked like it was on the ropes before rallying like a champion. The defense totally shut down Arkansas’ offense the rest of the game, not allowing a single point the rest of the way to rally for the win. It was one of the best performances the defense had all year as they forced 19 turnovers on the day.
Butler landed a pretty nice seed for the tournament despite eight losses and a first-round exit from its conference tournament because of its resume. The Bulldogs were the only team in the country to beat Villanova twice and also knocked off Arizona, Vanderbilt, and Cincinnati in non-conference action though to bolster their stats. This was a team that needed it after mind-numbing regular season losses to Indiana State, St. John’s, and Georgetown.
The No. 4 seed in the South proved to be good luck as the Bulldogs had to face two mid-majors that were double digit seeds in order to reach this point. Butler didn’t get much of a struggle from Winthrop, jetting out to a 14-point halftime lead and cruising the rest of the way, but Middle Tennessee State could have beaten this team under different circumstances. The Blue Raiders had 10 more shots than the Bulldogs, but just couldn’t sink enough of them to keep it close.
Comparable Games of Note
These teams last met in 2014 down in the Bahamas at the Battle 4 Atlantis and Butler finished on top with many of the players that were playing that day are still on these respective sides. The Bulldogs won the game despite shooting just 30.6 percent from the floor, because they were somehow able to crush the larger Tar Heels on the boards. Butler pulled down 10 more offensive rebounds than UNC on the day and that provided the difference as the Bulldogs used those 22 offensive rebounds to get the victory. They will need to do something very similar if they want to win here, but they have been extremely poor on the boards and North Carolina has been superb.
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