The Pitt basketball team led for the entire second half in an impressive 76-67 win over North Carolina in Chapel Hill Wednesday evening. Ithiel Horton led Pitt with 19 points, including a perfect 5-of-5 from three-point range as the Panthers have now won three in a row.

Pitt improved to 11-16 on the season with the win over the Tar Heels. Jeff Capel now owns a 3-2 record over North Carolina as Pitt's head coach.

The Panthers controlled this game from the midway point of the first half, as they went on an extended 21-2 run sparked by a trio of three-pointers from Horton, and also two from Mo Gueye.

Pitt carried that momentum into the second half, and led by as many as 21 points with 10:03 remaining, but North Carolina would not go away quietly. Pitt maintained a double-digit lead up until Caleb Love hit a pair of free throws with 2:28 remaining to make it 69-61. The Tar Heels got it down to six points on a Brady Manek basket, but a pair of big makes by John Hugley helped keep the Tar Heels at bay.

Hugley finished with 18 points and 5 rebounds in 27 minutes of action, as the Panthers' big man dealt with foul trouble throughout the game. He won the individual battle against North Carolina's Armando Bacot, who entered the game averaging a double double and is regarded as one of the top players in the conference.

Bacot totaled just 7 points and 8 rebounds.

The Panthers committed 18 turnovers, and had some tense moments in the waning minutes of the contest. North Carolina amped up the pressure with a full-court press, which gave Pitt issues inbounding the ball. Pitt overcame the surge, and gutted out a win thanks to those baskets by Hugley and a pair of Horton free throws to put it out of reach.

North Carolina is typically a fast tempo team, but Pitt held them to just 27% shooting in the first half and made it more of a half-court game that the Panthers prefer to play. For the game, North Carolina only had five fast break points, as Pitt managed to weather extended runs by the home team.

72 of Pitt's 76 points came from its starters. Femi Odukale finished with 10 points and 9 assists. Jamarius Burton contributed 14 points along with a team-high 7 rebounds. Pitt's four bench points proved to be important however, as William Jeffress and Noah Collier both had two key baskets in the second half.

Pitt had now won three-straight games in the month of February as a member of the ACC. Pitt has now won back-to-back road conference wins after starting the year 0-7 in those contests. The Panthers now return to Pittsburgh for a three-game home stand, starting with Georgia Tech on Saturday at the Petersen Events Center.