Tyler Hansbrough -Preview: Nevada at No. 1 North Carolina

With some stern words and a few hard practices, North Carolina's Roy Williams made sure a poor performance by the nation's top team didn't repeat itself.

The Tar Heels will look to dominate their second straight opponent and win their 12th straight to open the season when they host Nevada Thursday at the Smith Center.

Top-ranked North Carolina is 11-0 for the first time since the 1997-98 season, but that didn't save the team from drawing Williams' ire after opening a string of five straight home games last Wednesday with a sloppy 88-78 win over Nicholls State. After the game, Williams said he was "not satisfied with anything," and announced plans to punish his team with grueling practices in the following days.

They responded with a thorough 105-70 blowout of UC Santa Barbara on Saturday, shooting 57.1 percent from the field, outrebounding the Gauchos 57-30 and racking up a season-high 25 team assists.

"They had no choice this time," Williams said. "Either (play hard), or get on the track team."

Behind its fast-paced offense, Tar Heels led 52-32 at halftime and did not relent, starting the second half on a 19-7 run in just 4:17. Perhaps the only negative from that game was the Tar Heels shooting just 3-of-16 from 3-point range.

"Nobody wants to see Coach that mad again, so everybody's picked up their play," point guard Ty Lawson said. "When we've got a team down 20, get it to 30, make the game out of reach. We're trying to do everything to please (Williams)."

Against UC Santa Barbara, Lawson had 15 points and six assists, defensive specialist Marcus Ginyard had a career-high 17 points on 8-of-10 shooting from the field and Deon Thompson pulled down a season-high 12 rebounds. Wayne Ellington also had 17 points despite going 0-for-4 from 3-point range.

But North Carolina's leader was again Tyler Hansbrough, who scored 21 points, his fourth straight game with at least 20. Tyler Hansbrough shot 9-of-11 from the field, and is shooting 63.6 percent (35-of-55) in the last four games.

"The difference was that we got out to a better start defensively, got some stops, didn't let the other team get any confidence built up, and it really helped us," Tyler Hansbrough said.

Nevada (7-4) has won four straight Western Athletic Conference titles and went 29-5 last season, but started this season 2-4 after four-year standout Nick Fazekas graduated.

They've since won five in a row, including a 55-52 win at Northern Iowa on Saturday during which Nevada limited the Panthers to just to 32.2 percent shooting. Opponents have shot just 40.8 percent against Nevada this season, and forward JaVale McGee is among the top 10 in the nation with 3.5 blocked shots per game.

McGee averages 12.9 points, but senior guard Marcelus Kemp leads the Wolf Pack with 19.1 per game.

Nevada and North Carolina last played each other in February 1989, when the North Carolina Tar Heels won at home 109-86. Their only other meeting came the previous season, when North Carolina won 115-91 in Reno.

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