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Roy Williams should have recorded his halftime speech against Arkansas. The North Carolina basketball coach may need to break it out again before his Tar Heels play their Sweet Sixteen game Thursday against Washington State (7:27 p.m., WFMY-2).

With UNC leading 51-26, Williams -- somehow, with a straight face -- asked his players for more.

"He was in there talking about how we needed to get more stops," said sophomore forward Alex Stepheson. "When we go out there, we have to keep that edge, just buckle down from the get-go, because they are going to come after us."

The Tar Heels listened to their coach and proceeded to grind a Razorbacks team that was already down right into the floor of the RBC Center. UNC will need to perform a similar trick at Bobcats Arena in Charlotte. Despite putting up numbers that strongly suggest the Tar Heels are playing the best basketball in the nation by far, they are trying to convince themselves they can do even more.

"We can all get a little bit better and play a little harder and play a little smarter," said junior swingman Marcus Ginyard.

UNC dished out 53 assists and turned over the ball 16 times in two games in Raleigh. It was the first time this season the Tar Heels had fewer than 10 turnovers in consecutive games (nine against Mount St. Mary's, seven against Arkansas). The team's primary ball-handlers, Ty Lawson and Quentin Thomas, combined for 21 assists and zero turnovers.

Not good enough.

"Coach was saying we had a couple of turnovers when we were trying to set some picks and (the Razorbacks) jumped out and tried to double-team the picks," Stepheson said. "We had a few careless turnovers with that."

Even Lawson was able to find fault with the team's seven turnovers against Arkansas.

"That's a little too many," he said. "Probably we should get it down to three."

Everyone it seemed, contributed on the offensive end for the Tar Heels. Deon Thompson rebounded from an abysmal ACC tournament to post the highest two-game scoring total of his career (31 points). Fellow power forward Alex Stepheson scored in double-figures in back-to-back games for the first time in his career. Tyler Hansbrough and Wayne Ellington had their usual high production. Ginyard matched his career high with six assists against Arkansas.

Not good enough.

"We feel like a couple of guys are not necessarily playing up to their potential," Ginyard said.

Umm ... who?

"Danny," Lawson said, referring to forward Danny Green. "(Williams) wants him to pick up his game."

This wasn't Lawson playfully tossing his roommate, under the bus. Green, despite grabbing six rebounds against the Mountaineers and dishing out four assists with no turnovers against Arkansas, readily agreed.

"I haven't been scoring the way I usually score," he said. "I feel I'm the only person that's not playing the game that I usually play."

UNC shot better than 60 percent in both of its games in Raleigh, the first time it has done that in consecutive games since the 2005 season. The Tar Heels are shooting 54.3 percent from the field in the five games since Lawson returned to the starting lineup after an ankle injury. UNC outscored its two opponents in Raleigh by 70 points, setting the school mark for largest two-game combined margin of victory in NCAA tournament play. The previous two highest totals came in 1993 and 2005 -- both national title years.

Not good enough.

"Whoever we are playing, we have to play well," Williams said after the Arkansas rout. "In Charlotte they are not going to give us extra points because we played so well."

Not good enough for UNC, but maybe good enough for the rest of the nation.

"If they play like this the next weekend," Arkansas forward Sonny Weems said Sunday, "I don't think anybody in the nation can beat them."

Contact Jim Young at 373-7016 or jim.young @news-record.com