Jae’Lyn Withers has helped North Carolina regroup. Next comes Round 2 with No. 2 Duke

By Canadian Press on March 7, 2025.

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. (AP) — The frustration built for Jae’Lyn Withers. His role had slid from starter to spot-rotation minutes for a North Carolina team watching its season hurtle toward a bubble-bursting crashout.

What could he even do about it?

“Just find peace in developing and continuing to get better,” Withers said.

And his approach might have been the key to saving UNC’s season.

The Tar Heels have won six straight with their best stretch of sustained play all season, giving them at least the chance to play their way onto the right side of the NCAA Tournament bubble entering Saturday’s visit from second-ranked rival Duke. It’s been rooted in the 6-foot-9 Withers’ rise, stablizing a team once teetering as it churned through guard-heavy lineups.

“I’ll definitely take my flowers,” the fifth-year forward told The Associated Press with a smile. “But it’s more than just me. It’s a ‘we’ thing.”

Maybe so, but Withers has been the key to unlocking UNC’s lineup of late.

North Carolina (20-11, 13-6 Atlantic Coast Conference) has come a long way from early February, when the Tar Heels weren’t competitive and trailed by an unsightly 40-13 score against Duke at Cameron Indoor Stadium. Roughly a week later came a 20-point loss at No. 11 Clemson on Feb. 10 — a “rock bottom” moment, Withers said — that left a team that opened the year at No. 9 in the AP Top 25 at just 14-11.

Yet the Tar Heels haven’t lost since against a favorable stretch of the schedule, a run that began shortly after Withers returned to the starting lineup in that Clemson loss.

He is averaging 11.7 points and 7.2 rebounds in the six-game winning streak, a stretch that included him shooting 59% from the field and 13 of 23 (.565) from 3-point range.

“The way he’s able to shoot the ball, the way he can defend, I’m just proud of him just stepping up big-time for us because that’s what we needed,” teammate RJ Davis said. “Having him being efficient, having him on the floor, makes us 10 times better.”

Withers’ rise is amplified in the team totals during the winning streak.

The Tar Heels are averaging 90.8 points, their past five wins have come by double figures and they’ve scored at least 80 points in six straight ACC games for the first time since the 2016-17 season.

They’ve gone from being +38 in rebounding margin through the first 25 games to +66 in the past six. Their outside shooting has improved from 32.3% from behind the arc to 47.8% (65 of 136) in the past six games. And the assist rate on made baskets has gone has gone from 49.8% to 55.3% in that time, a sign that the Tar Heels are moving the ball more effectively to set up better shots.

“I think the biggest thing that’s different is just the confidence level they’re playing with, the aggressiveness, the cohesiveness,” Duke coach Jon Scheyer said. “I really feel they’re playing their best basketball that they’ve been playing all year.”

Withers, a key reserve on last year’s team that won the ACC regular-season race and earned a No. 1 NCAA seed, started the first seven games this year. But after UNC lost to No. 1 Auburn and No. 8 Michigan State in the Maui Invitational, Hubert Davis changed the starting lineup by pulling Withers as the team started tinkering with small-ball groupings.

Those lineups generally started some combination of wings Seth Trimble, Drake Powell and Ian Jackson alongside the undersized Davis-Elliot Cadeau backcourt, with either Jalen Washington or Ven-Allen Lubin as the lone big. Meanwhile, Withers’ minutes dwindled to an average of 10 minutes over 17 games, including twice as low as 3 minutes.

Withers said he talked often with his father and teammates to stay engaged. He worked on his skillset. The instate native out of Charlotte reflected on his basketball journey that began with three years at Louisville. And he came to a helpful conclusion: “I’m still in a great position.”

“One of the things that I always tell the guys: your number is always going to be called, a number of times,” Hubert Davis said. “I can’t tell you when, where, how and how much, or the manner in which it’s going to be called. But your job and responsibility when your number is called is to be ready to play.”

Withers was exactly that. He’s averaging 24.3 minutes per game in the win streak, paired with Lubin now as the primary big.

That has at least kept UNC’s NCAA hopes alive by stacking wins, even though those have come against teams in the bottom half of the league standings and none individually offer a major boost to a resume that lacks high-end victories.

Then again, the Tar Heels are playing with far more confidence and cohesion than earlier this season. And they have chances to help themselves, first against a team that has looked every bit like a Final Four favorite all year behind a national player of the year candidate in freshman star Cooper Flagg.

“The guys are a lot more confident, just not only because we’re winning but because we’re doing the little things HD is asking us to do with taking care of the turnovers, the boxouts, etc.,” Withers said. “I think that’s really helped us really find our way of the hole.”

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Aaron Beard, The Associated Press

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