CHAPEL HILL, N.C. — With just more than 10 minutes remaining in last night’s contest at North Carolina, the Terrapins men’s basketball team forced Marcus Paige into one of his five turnovers when the Tar Heels point guard drove into a crowded lane.

Jake Layman collected the ball, and the Terps, trailing 51-44, had an opportunity to come within two possessions of the Tar Heels for the first time all half. The forward walked the ball up the floor before passing to trailing forward Evan Smotrycz, who launched a 3-pointer in rhythm from the top of the arc with 28 seconds left on the shot clock. The ball clanged off the back of the rim and North Carolina secured the rebound.

Smotrycz’s miss was one of 17 missed three-point attempts for the Terps, who shot a dismal 26.1 percent from distance in a 75-63 loss at the Dean E. Smith Center.

Coach Mark Turgeon, though, was adamant his squad didn’t settle for jump shots, even though referees Karl Hess, Michael Stephens and Mike Stuart called 47 fouls between the two teams, mostly on attempts by players to cut through the defense and get to the rim.

“We were going to the basket,” Turgeon said. “We were driving. You might want to watch the film. We were driving it.”

The Terps took 20 free-throw attempts last night but just six in the second half. The Tar Heels made it to the line 37 times — where they shot 51.4 percent — and they also took eight fewer 3-pointers. Paige, who led all scorers with 25 points, went 9-of-11 from the free-throw line, knocking down open jump shots when they were available and aggressively attacking the rim when he saw a crease.

Meanwhile, the Terps sharpshooters struggled to find their stroke from the opening tip and never consistently found it in the game. Guard Seth Allen, who was coming off 16 points and seven assists in a blowout victory at Virginia Tech on Saturday, shot 3-of-10 from beyond the arc, and Smotrycz, who entered the contest as the Terps’ best three-point shooter (39.8 percent), went 2-of-6.

“We had some open looks,” Smotrycz said. “They’ve got a lot of long, athletic guys who are blocking a lot of shots.”

Guard Nick Faust embodied the contrast between the Terps’ outside shooting and their success when they got to the basket. The junior entered the game after the under-16 media timeout and missed two consecutive three-point attempts. Then, Allen stole the ball from Paige and tossed an outlet pass to a streaking Faust, who exploded to the basket, beating three defenders before finishing with a ferocious one-handed slam.

Just less than a minute later, Faust retrieved a defensive rebound, dribbled the length of the floor and attacked the rim once again, this time earning one of the Terps’ 18 fouls in the game. He made both free throws.

Faust’s sudden burst of aggression fueled an 8-0 Terps run that brought the team back within eight points after falling behind by 16 points in the first five minutes. But Faust failed to maintain that mentality and finished 2-of-6 from the field and 0-of-4 from three-point range for eight points.

The Terps trailed for the full 40 minutes last night, and the majority of their 3-pointers were quality looks — the shots just weren’t falling. Free throws, however, provided an opportunity to put points on the scoreboard with the clock stopped, something that could have been essential to a comeback attempt in a hostile environment.

But in the end, the flow of the game tilted toward the Terps continuing to shoot from the outside, something they have had success with before this season.

“We weren’t getting a lot of calls at the rim,” Smotrycz said.