CHAPEL HILL, N.C. — Roy Williams pulled a doubleheader, in his own words, on Saturday. The day started by watching his former player, Coby White, drop 20 points in a Charlotte Hornets victory over the Portland Trailblazers — a fitting performance in White’s home debut. With one win down, Williams made his way back to Chapel Hill for No. 18 North Carolina’s contest against Virginia Tech and took his familiar corner seat right by the team tunnel.

The former UNC coach was treated to a second win on Saturday night, as the Tar Heels closed out the month of February with an 89-82 ACC win at the Smith Center.

Three Tar Heels finished with 15 or more points in the victory. Redshirt junior forward Henri Veesaar led the way with 26 points — tying his career-high and recording his sixth game with 20 or more points this season. Senior guard Seth Trimble, fresh off his career-high 30 point performance against Louisville on Monday, scored 20 against the Hokies. Jonathan Powell added 15 points off the bench.

Tobi Lawal led the Hokies (18-11, 7-9 ACC) with 16 points.

With the win, North Carolina tied its record for most wins in the Smith Center in a season (the Tar Heels were 17-1 in 2011-12).

The Tar Heels played without freshman phenom Caleb Wilson — the team’s leading scorer, rebounder, steal-getter and shot-blocker — for the fifth straight game since the 6-10 forward from Atlanta broke a bone in his left hand at Miami on Feb. 10. Wilson is targeting a return for the team’s regular-season finale against Duke (Blue Devil Gear).

The Tar Heels (23-6, 11-5 ACC) will return to action to host Clemson on Tuesday, on Senior Night, before heading to Durham to take on the top-ranked Blue Devils on March 7.

Powell provides early boost

Powell, rarely lacking in confidence or flair, stated in the preseason that he thought of himself as “the best shooter in the country.”

But Powell, like many of UNC’s guards, has had an up-and-down season. In North Carolina’s victory over Louisville, he was held scoreless. Powell added just five points in a road victory against Syracuse the previous game, and his last double-digit scoring effort came against the Orange on Feb. 2. That contest also marked his only double-digit performance of the ACC slate. Well, until Saturday.

Powell led all scorers with 12 points in the first half — matching his best performance in ACC play in eight minutes of game time. He provided a much-needed boost for the Tar Heels, who went back-and-forth with the Hokies ahead of the break.

Of his three 3-pointers in the first half, the last probably carried the most weight. The Hokies had battled from down eight points to up four in a matter of minutes, and had just called a 30-second timeout with 1:14 remaining before halftime. Out of the stoppage, Powell sank another triple — this one on an assist from Zayden High — to cut UNC’s deficit to one point.

Powell hit one more 3-pointer for good measure in the second-half, bringing his scoring total to 15 points — his best performance in ACC play.

Veesaar leads improved rebounding effort

Veesaar was hard on himself Monday night after UNC’s win over Louisville.

The Tar Heels had just knocked off a top-25 opponent at home, yes, but the seven-footer felt he could’ve done more to help the team.

“I had one rebound at Syracuse,” Veesaar said. “I had three rebounds (against Louisville). So just doing that as a seven-footer is unacceptable. I gotta do a better job. I feel like, just coming back from the little injury, I haven’t been feeling like myself. So I gotta work on that and get back to where I was at before — helping the team win the rebounding battle.”

By halftime on Saturday, Veesaar led his team on the boards with three rebounds. He also recorded eight points in the first half, as well as a big block in the final minute of action before halftime.

Veesaar’s three-point play — he was fouled on a drive to the rim and, yes, made his free throw — with four seconds in the half tied the game at 44-44 after the Tar Heels fell behind by four just minutes before.

The Estonia native ran hot to start the second half, recording 10 points in the first seven minutes of play after halftime. Veesaar ended up having 18 of his 26 points in the second half on an efficient 8-of-11 shooting performance from the floor. He also finished with a team-high seven boards.

Veesaar was 1 of 2 from the line, missing his final attempt with 21 seconds remaining, which would’ve given Veesaar a new season-best.

Tar Heels make more than half of their free throws

After UNC’s win over Louisville on Monday, all Hubert Davis could do was chuckle.

He’d just been asked in his postgame press conference about his team’s free-throw shooting percentage, which ranks No. 319 out of 361 Division I programs. What could he do, as a coach, to help the team’s 68% mark improve?

“Pray,” he said with a chuckle.

Davis later detailed a sequence from the Louisville game in which he encouraged freshman guard Derek Dixon to take a pause before he rushed to the free throw line. But other than some slight reminders, and working on free throw shooting at practice (which the team does every day), there is probably little Davis or his staff can do to coach up this particular aspect of the game.

“That’s just something that we’re going to have to get better at,” Davis said Monday, “because down the stretch, we need to be able to make those.”

On Saturday, a hopeful sign for the Tar Heels: they made 23 out of 30 attempts from the charity stripe (76.7%). This comes on the heels of their season-low 47.4% performance from the free throw line on Monday — the second game in a row UNC set a season low from the line.

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