But Sunday afternoon at the Birmingham-Jefferson Civic Center, the often timid Tar Heels showed they’d learned how to play the role of defensive devils overnight.

The eighth-seeded Tar Heels (20-13) out-physicaled Team Physical, top-seeded Stanford, to claim a rousing 60-53 blood-and-guts South Regional second-round victory and a spot in the NCAA Tournament’s Sweet 16 for the 17th time in the past 20 years.

“Everyone will say this was an upset,” said UNC point guard Ed Cota. “But we knew we were capable of winning two games here. We just needed to get back to UNC basketball, get back to playing UNC defense.”

Cota’s analysis was on target — just like the passes that netted him 10 assists. This one was about defense.

Carolina hadn’t won while scoring as few as 60 points all season. In fact, the Heels, who made it a 20-win season for the 30th time in a row, had won only once (65-45 over Clemson) when they scored fewer than 70 points.

But they hadn’t defended like this. The paint was an NBA battle, in which UNC’s Kris Lang and Brendan Haywood traded fouls, trash-talk, haymakers, elbows and takedowns with Stanford’s macho man Mark Madsen and its huge, double-parked Collins twins, Jason and Jarron. Lang and Haywood, with some heavy-handed assistance from reserve Julius Peppers, held their own.

“We weren’t gonna give an inch in there,” said Haywood.

“They negated us on the inside,” said Stanford coach Mike Montgomery, who called the loss “numbing and incomprehensible” among other things. “It’s a simple game — a game about putting a ball in a basket. Today, we couldn’t do that. We didn’t put our best foot forward , didn’t play as well as we can. But at the same time, Carolina was very big, very smart and very good.”

When the Heels didn’t surrender in the early battle of wills, Stanford became “Stand-ford.” The push-and-shove stalemate in the lane turned the field of fire to the perimeter. And there the Tar Heels won the day, as Jason Capel and Joseph Forte harassed Stanford’s celebrated shooters into an abysmal effort. Stanford (27-4) shot 34.5 percent, its fourth worst effort of the year. The Cardinal scored nine fewer points than they had in any game this season.

Stanford senior David Moseley scored a team-leading 17 points, but was just 3-for-12 in the second half. Star freshman Casey Jacobsen was a lot worse. He shot 1-for-8 on 3s and struggled against both UNC’s suddenly point-preventing point zone and Capel’s man-to-man.

Carolina’s own stellar freshman, Forte, however, stood and delivered. He had 17, including the most critical eight points. He carried Carolina from a 47-45 deficit with 5:15 remaining to a 53-47 lead with 3:31 to go. In that stretch, Forte converted a tough drive and two 3-pointers set up by Cota.

“Up until then, Joe couldn’t knock anything down,” said UNC coach Bill Guthridge. “But — well, he’s just good.”

“Joseph finally relaxed,” said Cota, who also found time for seven boards, giving him 500 for his career. “He gave us the shots we had to have.”

The Heels got off to a quick start, which was critical. They led 6-2 after hoops by Cota, Haywood and Lang.

But with Moseley getting hot, Stanford ran off eight straight for a 10-6 lead. The Cardinal then controlled play until late in the first half.

Stanford led 25-17 with 3:12 left after Jacobsen got loose for his only 3 of the day, but Capel answered with two quick threes for his first points of the afternoon.

Then Peppers, the star football player, proved he’s a man for all seasons. He tossed around his massive frame like a wrecking ball for a couple of minutes, blocking shots, sticking in a miss and generally intimidating. When the smoke cleared, Carolina had an 11-2 run to end the half and a 28-27 lead.

“And lots of momentum,” said Cota. “Julius gave us a huge lift.”

“Still,” deadpanned Guthridge, “we might just loan Julius back to the football team in the fall.”

The start of the second half was critical, and again the Tar Heels who asserted themselves.

Haywood, who scored 12, got one of his four blocks to terminate Stanford’s opening possession and Lang, who had left the game briefly in the first half with a muscle cramp in his chest, scored four of his 10 points on consecutive dishes from Cota.

Carolina stretched its lead to 34-27 at 17:47 on a pair of Forte free throws, as the Tar Heels made it a dominating 17-2 burst bridging the halves. But then the Collins twins took over, moving the Cardinal out to a 47-43 lead with 8:20 left.

“It was a game of spurts,” said Cota. “They had some, we had some. Fortunately, we had the last one.”

The pivotal run was 10 straight points keyed by the back-to-back Forte 3-pointers for a 53-47 Tar Heel lead.

Stanford got within four points on three occasions down the stretch, but Haywood, Capel and Forte answered each threat with clutch free throws.

After the win over Missouri on Friday, Guthridge said his team had just played its best game. He grinned on Sunday and made a retraction. The Stanford game now holds that distinction.

“Coach said all year long that we were just a step away from being good,” said Haywood. “But I guess we found that step, because we’re still here and a lot of other teams aren’t.”

“This team has been resilient. It deserved this one,” said Guthridge, who’s obviously relishing his team’s belated revival. “We lost a few games in the season and we’re sorry about that, but maybe we’ve got a few wins left to make up for it.