North Carolina is arguably playing its best basketball of the season and boy, did it come at a good time.  After a blowout of Florida Gulf Coast in the first round, the Tar Heels would face a good Providence team that has two of the best scorers in the nation.  Kris Dunn and Ben Bentil have been leading the Friars of the Big East Conference all season, and this game would be no different.  The only problem for Providence is that the Tar Heels are flat-out good.  Bentil and Dunn would be able to keep their team in the game early.  The first half was back and forth with neither team able to stretch a lead more than seven.  North Carolina eventually held a four-point lead heading into halftime.  After halftime Bentil and Dunn combined for six straight points to give the Friars a two-point lead, but it was all UNC from this point on.  They would increase their lead in bunches, first from five, then to ten and even at one point a 21-point advantage en route to an easy victory.  UNC’s Brice Johnson and company were too much to handle.  Johnson had a team high 21 points and 10 rebounds.  Joel Berry II and Justin Jackson scored 15 apiece, and Isaiah Hicks and Marcus Paige added 13 and 12 to round out a very balanced attack from the winners of the ACC.  Dunn and Bentil did all they could as they notched 29 and 21 points.  Nobody else for Providence could produce more than seven points.

North Carolina, the number-one seed in the East, advances to play the Indiana Hoosiers of the Big Ten.  North Carolina will look to reach its first Elite Eight since 2012 when these two storied programs square off.