Objectively speaking, even with all their warts, this season Carolina is a better basketball team than NC State. The Heels are ranked 30th in KenPom (State is 91st) and 40th in the NET rankings (State is 113th). The Heels are favored and should be — State has followed up their magical late-season run last year with a slow start to this years campaign.
Of course, games aren’t won or lost on paper or in computer analytics. This goes doubly for rivalry games. I expect this to be a close game — hopefully the Heels can at least slightly make up for last season’s loss in the ACC championship game.