A Tournament of North Carolina's Tournament Wins (Roy Williams Region)

With North Carolina not invited to participate in the 2023 NCAA tournament, I read someone on Twitter roast Tar Heel fans (like me) that we are just going to sit and watch old tournament games to fill the void.

Hmm.  What a great idea.

Watching old tournament games sure is fun and it can make you remember the good times while the bad times forced you to have nothing to do.  So instead of just watching old North Carolina hoops games, how about we create out own tournament of Heels' NCAA tournament wins to see which one is the best.

So below are the 32 best games, and I divided them up into four regions -- Jordan, McGuire, Williams and Smith regions. We will battle over the next three weeks to see who comes out as the best game in Carolina tournament history. The seedings have the six tournament champions getting the No. 1 seeds and the top No. 2 seeds. From there, just the best games no matter where they happened in the tournament. 

Here is the entire tournament revealed. In a few days, we will have our first round winners and our Sweet 16. Here ya go: 

JORDAN REGION
1 - UNC/Georgetown (1982) vs 8 - UNC/Notre Dame (1985)
4 - UNC/Oklahoma (1990) vs 5 - UNC/Cincinnati (1993)
3 - UNC/Ohio State (1946) vs 6 - UNC/Villanova (1982)
2 - UNC/Michigan State (1957) vs 7 - UNC/Ohio (2012)

1-UNC/Georgetown (1982) vs 4-UNC/Oklahoma (1990)
2-UNC/Michigan State (1957) vs 3-UNC/Ohio State (1946)

MCGUIRE REGION
1 - UNC/Kansas (1957) vs 8 - UNC/Baylor (2022)
4 - UNC/Kentucky (1995) vs 5 - UNC/Oregon (2017)
3 - UNC/Kentucky (2017) vs 6 - UNC/Temple (1991)
2 - UNC/Duke (2022) vs 7 - UNC/Oklahoma (2009)

1-UNC/Kansas (1957) vs 4-UNC/Kentucky (1995)
2-UNC/Duke (2022) vs 3-UNC/Kentucky (2017)

WILLIAMS REGION
1 - UNC/Illinois (2005) vs 8 - UNC/Purdue (1977)
4 - UNC/UNLV (1977) vs 5 - UNC/Stanford (2000)
3 - UNC/Davidson (1969) vs 6 - UNC/Notre Dame (1977)
2 - UNC/Gonzaga (2017) vs 7 - UNC/Loyola Marymount (1988)

SMITH REGION
1 - UNC/Michigan (1993) vs 8 - UNC/James Madison (1982)
4 - UNC/Virginia (1981) vs 5 - UNC/Tulsa (2000)
3 - UNC/Houston (1982) vs 6 - UNC/Villanova (2005)
2 - UNC/Michigan State (2009) vs 7 - UNC/Charlotte (1998)

On to the Williams region.

This may be the more difficult region to get through as none of these games are as truly iconic as some of the others we have dealt with. In the first showdown, we have Roy Williams' first national championship against a 2nd round game against Purdue in 1977. I'm taking the title. 

The second game is our first upset ... and it really was an upset. The 2000 Tar Heels were very talented, albeit flawed and not having a great regular season. But they upset No. 1 seed Stanford in the second round and ended up in the Final Four. Mike O'Koren was outstanding for the 1977 Heels that beat UNLV in the Final Four by a single point. I'm going to go with the upset in 2000. 

The third game features yet another game from 1977 -- a Sweet 16 win over Notre Dame on St. Patrick's Day. That falls short to the 1969 win over Davidson. Charlie Scott's jumper beat Davidson and sent the Heels to their third straight Final Four. 

Finally, two games who couldn't be more opposite. You have the UNC-Gonzaga title fight that was filled with big, bruising bodies banging into each other all night and making for a foul prone and clunky flowed title tilt. The 1988 win over Loyola Marymount wasn't a thrilling game (Heels won by 26 points) as much as it was about Carolina scoring 123 points against the high-paced Lions during their Hank Gathers/Bo Kimble heyday. Nice to see Ranzino Smith pour 27 points in that game, while JR Reid and Jeff Lebo each had 19. UNC shot 79% from the field that day!!! I'm going with the title game that saw the Heels rally late and Kennedy Meeks make the most memorable block in Carolina history. 

So there you have it. Next up with the Dean E. Smith Region and we will then have our own Sweet 16 set!