Lucas: Tar Heels Go Through Summer Practices

By Adam Lucas

How times have changed.

It's only been a year since Hubert Davis directed the first summer practice of his head coaching tenure. But Tuesday's practice at the Smith Center, one of a handful the Tar Heels will hold this summer, just felt more normal than last summer.

Part of that is the personnel, of course. When the Tar Heels walk out on the court, it's startling how familiar they look. There's Armando Bacot. And Caleb Love and RJ Davis and Leaky Black and a very large percentage of last year's points other than Brady Manek. The Tar Heels could conceivably—likely?—put together a starting lineup with two fifth-year players, a fourth-year senior, and two third-year guards. That might be the most experienced starting lineup in modern Tar Heel basketball history.

They're many of the same faces as last year at this time, but very different expectations. And Davis isn't hiding his team from the summer chatter that the Tar Heels should be a national championship contender.

"I'm not worried about all that stuff about being the number one team in the country," he said on Tuesday while teaching some defensive fundamentals to the newcomers. "What I want is that there is nothing soft and nothing passive about anything we do. We're going to punch first."

That's an echo of the mentality that was partially responsible for changing the course of last season. Now it's become one of those basic tenets of Davis's coaching philosophy, something so essential to the program's identity that it's being reinforced in July, well over four months before the first game.

And let's be honest: Tuesday's session was almost completely review for all those faces you know so well. But as assistant coach Brad Frederick introduced the different types of defensive closeouts Carolina plays on individual opponents—"Curry closeouts" are reserved for the most deadly of perimeter shooters, an homage to Steph Curry—it was at least partially new for the group of newcomers that includes Northwestern transfer Pete Nance, plus freshmen Tyler Nickel, Seth Trimble and Jalen Washington.

The overwhelming impression from watching the pair of seven-minute scrimmages that concluded practice is that Carolina has significant experienced depth, to the point that a dozen different players could reasonably hope to earn meaningful minutes. Almost everyone in that group made noteworthy plays in the scrimmage. That included Puff Johnson scoring through contact from Armando Bacot and Caleb Love accepting the challenge of guarding and being guarded by Coby White—in town to work out with the Tar Heels, and it seems almost impossible to believe that White and current Tar Heel Leaky Black were in the same entering class—and turning in a couple impressive sequences.

For those returning players, it's been a blessed summer, as they reap the rewards of NIL legislation and build off the goodwill generated by last season's run to the national championship game. But they were quickly returned to Earth by the pair of camp scrimmages held during June's Carolina basketball camp. In the first game, the current team was lackadaisical and was torched by Luke Maye and a team of alums, after which they received a harsh lecture on the importance of playing hard every time they step on the court. They were more competitive in the second game against the alums, but still beaten handily, this time by a red-hot Marcus Paige and his alum teammates.

It may be that people everywhere other than Chapel Hill are more impressed with the Tar Heels than their Carolina Family brethren. And it will undoubtedly be a challenge to maintain the same focus they had for the final month of the 2022 season throughout a long, six-month 2022-23 season.

But there's no disputing that it's an unusual luxury to have so much experience on the court all the time. As the Tar Heels worked through the shell drill on Tuesday, Jeff Lebo paused the session and turned to the freshmen. "When you're off the court, it's not time to relax," he said. "If I'm watching this drill, and I'm a guard, I'm watching Caleb or RJ. If I'm a big guy, I'm watching Mando. That's the best way to learn."

Players Mentioned

Armando Bacot

Leaky Black

RJ Davis

Puff Johnson

Caleb Love

Brady Manek

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