Mike DeCourcy

DURHAM, N.C. -

For the sake of Roy Williams earning some of that fat North Carolina paycheck, the coach called for a series of ball screens to be set for point guard Ty Lawson in the second half of the Tar Heels' Wednesday night visit to Duke. Even a play as simple as this was a bit of tactical overkill. He'd already taken care of the only necessary strategy during halftime, when he told the rest of the team to stay the heck out of Lawson's way.

Lawson did not need screens to leave behind Duke's Greg Paulus, Nolan Smith or any other defender the Devils chose to put in his way. He only needed the ball, some Nike high-tops and a foul lane with as little traffic as possible.

Though Lawson was brilliant only for 20 minutes of Carolina's 101-87 victory over rival Duke, this was the game of his life. This was the game scouts had promised we'd see when he signed with the Heels nearly four years ago. This was the game that, if repeated often enough, could carry his team to a national championship the players insist is their goal but occasionally don't seem to covet.

"We were sorry in the first half," Williams said. "We said we were going to come out and guard people, show a sense of urgency, and we didn't do that."

The appalling first-half defense was a team-wide infection. Duke shot nearly 62 percent from the floor and got huge contributions from all their most important offensive options in building a 52-44 halftime lead. The second half was nothing like that. The Devils shot about half as well and allowed themselves to be conned into firing 15 times from 3-point range. They hit twice.

"We just dug deep," said Heels junior guard Wayne Ellington. "In the first half, we were a little too comfortable out there."

As the defense floundered through the first half, the offense performed, at most, adequately. One game earlier, Duke had changed its lineup and restored Paulus — whose problems containing penetration are well established — to the starting point guard spot. Early on, Lawson treated this invitation suspiciously.

"I was trying to get everybody else involved," he said.

Lawson did not enter this edition of the Duke rivalry with the finest big-game record. He scored nine points and committed four turnovers in an earlier loss at Wake Forest. He scored nine and operated as if he'd been reading some other coach's scouting report when the Heels fell to Kansas in the 2008 Final Four.

In the tiny Cameron visitors' locker room during halftime, though, Williams and his staff explained to everyone how much different the final 20 minutes of the Duke game could be if turned over to Lawson.

"On the board we showed them two different scenarios where we had two post players standing two feet from each other and both of them in the lane," Williams said. "You've got to have better spacing."

Slideshow   Psycho T Check out the heart and soul of the North Carolina Tar Heels, Tyler Hansbrough, in action. NBC Sports

Everybody listened, and it almost was too easy after that. Lawson would take the ball to the right side and either wait for a ball screen to be set against his defender, or not. Either way, he'd then drive the ball down the lane and bank in a layup. He scored 21 of his season-high 25 points after the break. It was no coincidence Carolina blew out the Devils by 22 points during that period.

"He's really strong, and he's strong with the ball," Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski said. "Even when you're trying to corral him, he keeps the ball so low. He played a great game tonight. It was almost impossible for us to defend him on every exchange. He's a great weapon for them, because he makes other weapons better — and they have a few other weapons."

Krzyzewski said he expected Lawson would "play basketball for a long time." By that, he meant a lengthy NBA career. Should Lawson play more games the way he did against Duke, though, it also should be a while before this season ends.

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