NIT BASKETBALL North Carolina defeats Stanford to capture crown

The Tar Heels, 8-20 a year ago, are off to a 5-0 start.
NEW YORK (AP) -- North Carolina, one of the youngest teams in the country, is off to one of college basketball's best starts -- and last season seems a long time ago.
The Tar Heels, with their heralded freshman class again leading the way, beat Stanford 74-57 Friday night in the championship game of the Preseason NIT.
Their 5-0 start has the Tar Heels three wins short of matching their victory total from 2001-02, an 8-20 mark that was the worst in school history.
Best start since 1998-99
This is North Carolina's best start since it went 8-0 in 1998-99, a season that also included a Preseason NIT championship over Stanford.
Rashad McCants had 18 points for the Tar Heels, while fellow freshmen Raymond Felton had 16 points and seven assists and Sean May added 12 points and seven rebounds.
It wasn't a perfect night for the Tar Heels, who withstood a scoring drought in each half, but for a team that starts three freshmen and two sophomores, it was another impressive performance.
North Carolina beat No. 2 Kansas 67-56 in Wednesday's semifinals, and there was no letdown for the young team, even in its first extended outing against a zone defense.
Josh Childress and Julius Barnes each had 17 points for Stanford (4-1), which beat then-No. 10 Xavier in the second round of the tournament and No. 7 Florida in the semifinals.
In the third-place game, senior forward Matt Bonner and freshman forward Matt Walsh each had 22 points to lead No. 7 Florida to an 83-73 victory over No. 2 Kansas.
McCants, who was limited to 12 minutes in the first half because of foul trouble, opened the second half by hitting consecutive 3-pointers, and then sophomore Jackie Manuel hit another 3 to cap a 9-2 run that gave North Carolina a 48-33 lead with 18:13 to play.
McCants earns MVP honor
The Tar Heels went 5:20 without a field goal as the Cardinal pulled to 63-51, but McCants, the tournament MVP, made one of two free throws and then had a driving dunk on the baseline to make it 66-51 with 5:38 left. Stanford never got closer than 13 points the rest of the way.
The Tar Heels made five of their first 10 3-point attempts in taking a 37-17 lead with 5:24 to play in the first half. Felton had three of those 3s, and it was his layup on a nice pass from Jawad Williams that made it 37-17.
As easily as the baskets were coming in the first 141/2 minutes for North Carolina, there weren't any to be made over the rest of the half. Stanford was able to get to 39-31 with 14 seconds left in the half as the Tar Heels missed their last seven shots and turned the ball over three times.