North Carolina rolls again

Wayne Ellington has spent the past year thinking about the last-second shot he missed in regulation against Georgetown that would have sent North Carolina to the Final Four. Instead, the Hoyas won in overtime and sent the Tar Heels home with visions of what might have been.

Now, after two dominating NCAA tournament performances, the Tar Heels look like a team that hasn't forgotten.

"I think everybody realizes it's tournament time," Ellington said after North Carolina's 108-77 win over Arkansas on Sunday. "You lose a game, your season's over. (We're) coming out and leaving everything on the line every game."

So far, top-seeded North Carolina has made everything look easy in the East Regional, running out to big early leads and cracking the 100-point mark with plenty of time left on the clock. The Tar Heels now head to Charlotte to face fourth-seeded Washington State for the round of 16 in front of what is sure to be another home-state crowd.

They started with a 113-74 win against No. 16 seed Mount St. Mary's. Then came an equally dominating performance that made North Carolina the first team to score 100 points in its first two NCAA games since Loyola Marymount did it against New Mexico State and Michigan in 1990.

On Sunday, North Carolina scored the first nine points, led 51-26 at halftime and shot 68 percent for the game against a team that had upset Vanderbilt and Tennessee in the Southeastern Conference tournament last week.

"We had everything working on all cylinders," said Ty Lawson, who had 19 points.

Even hard-to-please coach Roy Williams, who can always find something to worry about, couldn't deny how sharp his team looked in Raleigh, about a half-hour drive from the Chapel Hill campus.

"We were pretty doggone good," he said. "We really were."

It marked only the third time in the past 25 years that the Tar Heels won both of their first two NCAA games by 20 or more points. The only other teams to do it — 1993 and 2005 — went on to win the national championship. The Tar Heels also tied the school's single-season record for victories, matching the '93 team and the 1998 squad that reached the Final Four in San Antonio.

North Carolina improved to 23-1 in NCAA games played in its home state.

Sonny Weems had 19 points to lead the ninth-seeded Razorbacks (23-12), who earned their first NCAA win in nine years by beating Indiana in Friday's first round. But Arkansas got no closer than 21 points in the second half, prompting coach John Pelphrey to quip, "We probably could've started six today, and I don't know if that would've helped or not."

"If they play like this, I don't think anybody in the nation can beat them," Weems said. "They're not the No. 1 team in the nation for no reason."

The Tar Heels didn't get a particularly big day from All-American Tyler Hansbrough, who finished with 17 points on 6-for-14 shooting. But he made five of seven free throws, which allowed him to surpass Duke's Christian Laettner for the most made free throws in a career for an ACC player.

Deon Thompson finished with 16 points on 8-for-8 shooting for North Carolina, and frontcourt mate Alex Stepheson had 10 on 5-for-5 shooting. Eleven players scored for the Tar Heels, and Williams was able to empty his bench and give his regulars plenty of time to cheer from the sideline for the second straight game.

North Carolina finished with 28 assists and just seven turnovers, moving the ball with ease to get plenty of open looks and earn its 13th straight win.

"We don't think that winning two games in the NCAA tournament is a huge success for us," junior Marcus Ginyard said. "Coach just talked about it in the locker room: we've got another two-game tournament to play next weekend. And that's what we're focused on right now. At this point, this game does not mean anything to us any more. This is just not where this team wants to end up."