In the first meeting back in December, North Carolina beat Michigan State by a 35-point margin. For all the hype that the title game would be different—that UNC would have a much tougher time with an improved MSU team, this being practically a home game for the Spartans—it wasn’t. On the same court, only 92 miles from Michigan State’s campus, the Tar Heels shut down the Spartans with a hot offense and stifling defense.

Michigan State hardly resembled the team that beat the University of Connecticut Huskies 82-73 on Saturday. Early timeouts by the Spartans failed to calm the team or make the Tar Heels play a slower game.

Being the strong team that it is, North Carolina had a tremendous first half, taking the largely pro-Michigan State crowd out of the game early and setting an NCAA tournament record for most points scored in the first half with 55. With a number of Michigan State starters in trouble after only the first 10 minutes of the game, North Carolina was able to put together runs on the Spartans’ defense to earn its largest lead of the game at 24.

When the Tar Heels did miss a shot, they were frequently able to gather the offensive rebounds to put up second and third opportunities. In an effort to keep pace with the speedier North Carolina team, MSU often took poor shots and attempted passes that sailed out of bounds or wound up in the other team’s hands.

During the course of the game, UNC won the turnover battle, forcing 21 MSU turnovers. Ty Lawson led the way for North Carolina with eight steals and 21 points. Wayne Ellington earned the Final Four’s Most Outstanding Player Award for the Tar Heels after scoring 19 points in the final and 20 in Saturday’s semifinal against Villanova. He was joined on the all-tournament team by Lawson and Tyler Hansbrough, who scored 18 points in each of his outings in the Final Four.