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The North Carolina basketball team is having their most consistent season of the Hubert Davis era this year, and the Tar Heels are hoping to win the ACC outright this weekend. North Carolina has just one game remaining as they will hit the road to take on rival Duke on Saturday night. The Tar Heels currently have a one game lead in the conference standings on the Blue Devils, and a win on Saturday will lock up the conference title.
After the regular season concludes, North Carolina basketball will move onto the postseason. First, the ACC Tournament, which will happen next week, and then the NCAA Tournament begins the following week.
Since Hubert Davis took over as the head coach of the Tar Heels, the team has had two very interesting seasons. In year one, North Carolina was solid all year, but they weren't anything special. They made the NCAA Tournament as an eight seed, but they got hot at the right time, and they made it all the way to the national title game. The Tar Heels had a big lead over Kansas at halftime, and it looked like Davis was going to win a national title in his first season.
Unfortunately for North Carolina, the Jayhawks stormed back in the second half and ended up winning the game. It was crushing for the Tar Heels, but they still did beat Duke at Duke in Coach K's last ever home game, and they knocked the Blue Devils out of the tournament in the Final Four. There was a ton to build on.
After the deep tournament run in 2022, people expected big things from the North Carolina basketball team in the 2022-23 season. The Tar Heels started the season as the preseason number 1 team, and it looked like they had all the tools to make a run at a national title. However, North Carolina ended up shockingly missing the NCAA Tournament. That doesn't happen often to teams ranked #1 to start the year.
This is the first season that Hubert Davis has had his Tar Heels playing consistent, good basketball all season long. The Tar Heels are 24-6 on the year overall and 16-3 in ACC play. They are ranked #7 in the country, and they should end up being anywhere from a one to a three seed in the NCAA Tournament. North Carolina has the potential to make a deep run, but there is one thing that could hold them back.
One flaw that could spoil North Carolina's season
It's hard to find something that this North Carolina basketball team struggles with, but one thing that could hurt them in the tournament is that they don't have a lot of guys that have experienced being a top seed in March. Obviously a lot of their key guys were on the 2021-22 team that went to the national title, but they were the team doing the spoiling in that tournament. As a lower seed going for an upset, you have nothing to lose, but as a high seed trying to avoid one, the pressure is really on.
The Tar Heels will have to rely on their leaders to right the ship when they inevitably get into a close game in the tournament. Armando Bacot and RJ Davis are the two biggest leaders on this team, and they know how to win on big stages. Can they lead this team to the Final Four?
