CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) -- North Carolina's Jason Capel remembered the empty feeling he had walking off the Charlotte Coliseum floor last December. On Friday night, he prevented a recurrence.

Capel scored 16 points and the second-ranked Tar Heels took out a year's worth of frustration by defeating the College of Charleston 72-54 in the Food Lion MVP Classic.

	College of Charleston's Tyrone Nelson (left) tries to tie up North Carolina's Jason Capel, who was otherwise unstoppable with 16 points Friday.

The victory came nearly one year to the day after the Cougars shocked then-No. 3 North Carolina 66-64 in the tournament. The dazed Tar Heels walked off the floor in silence as the College of Charleston faithful stormed the court to celebrate one of the greatest victories in school history.

"That loss hurt," Capel said. "We were on such a high after winning the Preseason NIT and beating some good teams. And they snuck up on us."

There were no heroics for the Cougars this time, however, as North Carolina (4-1) forced 10 first-half turnovers and converted them into 14 points on the way to a 12-point lead.

The Tar Heels stretched it to 20 early in the second half and the outmanned Cougars (2-1) were unable to get closer than 12 the rest of the way. North Carolina's lead reached 23 in the closing minutes.

"For a very young ballclub I felt we showed a lot of grit, a lot of determination and some feisty play," Cougars coach John Kresse said. "To hang with the Tar Heels for as long as we did shows positive signs for the future of our team."

With the victory came some bad news for the Tar Heels. Junior reserve forward Brian Bersticker suffered a broken bone in his left foot in the first half, is scheduled for surgery Monday and likely will miss 10 weeks, the team said. It is the same bone that was fractured in August, but this time it broke in a different spot, the team said.

Coach Bill Guthridge said he was holding out hope that the recovery could take as little as four weeks, but he admitted that such a timetable was probably not realistic.

"He's certainly going to miss a big chunk of the season," Guthridge said. "We're really going to miss Brian."

Kris Lang added 15 points and junior center Brendan Haywood had a career-high seven blocks for North Carolina, which two nights earlier dropped its home opener for the first time since 1928, losing 86-76 to Michigan State (No. 7 ESPN/USA Today, No. 8 AP).

"We got our wakeup call the other night," Capel said. "It was nice to see us come out and respond like we did."

The Cougars have only junior center Jody Lumpkin back from last year's Southern Conference championship team, and he spent the days leading up to the game battling an upset stomach. Lumpkin scored his team's first six points, but he was limited to seven the rest of the game. Leighton Bowie also had 13 for the Cougars, who had 16 turnovers that North Carolina converted into 18 points. Only six of those turnovers, however, came in the second half.

"I thought stage fright was going to be a major issue," Kresse said. "But they really didn't seem to get bothered by the bright lights. They settled down, and that's important to the future of our players."

The Tar Heels took control midway through the first half with an 18-6 run that was fueled by turnovers on five consecutive College of Charleston possessions. Capel capped the surge with a 3-pointer that made it 26-10, and the Cougars were unable to cut their deficit below eight the rest of the half.

The game began on a high note for the Cougars, who forced North Carolina into a shot-clock violation on its first possession. But after that, it was all Tar Heels.

By the time the first half ended, North Carolina had an 18-11 edge on the boards and had scored 20 points in the paint, most on an array of jumpers by Lang.