Hubert Davis: UNC still has the opportunity to turn this season around

Although having lost four of five to fall to 13-10, Hubert Davis knows North Carolina can still be all they hope to be.

Davis spoke about what this season can still be for the Tar Heels with the media on Monday following their latest loss this weekend at Duke. He said they still have at least ten to fourteen opportunities, pending their seeding in the conference tournament, to determine what they can do regardless of where they are right now.

“I do communicate with the team on, you know, regardless of where we are now and people’s opinions, this team still has a chance to achieve and experience everything that this team wants to achieve and experience,” said Davis. “We have nine more regular season games left – we have that. We have the ACC Tournament. So, like – and it’s all under our control in terms of us playing the best that we can be.”

North Carolina has itself in a bad spot with their stretch of play in the ACC. They already didn’t do much in the non-conference with a 7-5 mark with losses to all but one of the quality opponents they played. Now, over the last month, they’re at 6-5 in league play due to this recent skid at 1-4 with the lone victory requiring overtime at home.

With that, UNC is 13-10 while being 45th in the NET because of a 1-9 record against opponents in Quad I. That has them trending out of the projections for the NCAA Tournament with On3’s James Fletcher having them on the outside looking in on his bubble and with ESPN’s Joe Lunardi likely to do the same upon his next update this week.

Still, again, the Tar Heels aren’t so far out yet that they can’t get back in. Davis knows that better than most considering what they did in his debut season where they turned a so-so resumé into an appearance in the national title game.

“I won’t communicate that with the team because, you know, the only person on the team was RJ,” said Davis. “You know, obviously, we made a run to the national championship game my first year.”

North Carolina will have to play much better than they have of late to be back in the bracket come Selection Sunday. That’s why these next ten or so games will be so important for them and anything regarding them and the postseason.

“We still have an opportunity to turn this season around and we need to focus on becoming the best team that we can possibly become. And, at the end of the day, live with the results,” Davis said.