College basketball insider gives take on North Carolina next season

Head coach Hubert Davis made an NCAA Tournament run during his first season in charge of North Carolina, making it to the national championship game. While they ended up falling short to Kansas, it was something nobody was expecting out of the Tar Heels entering the month of March.

Now, Davis will be looking to run it back with a lot of players returning for the 2022-2023 season. Caleb Love was the latest to announce he would be staying in Chapel Hill and joins Armando Bacot and Leaky Black as starts coming back. Add in three incoming freshmen and UNC will have a talented squad and possibly be national championship favorites.

Jeff Goodman is wanting to pump the breaks on North Carolina, however. He gave his take on how the Tar Heels will fare next season, claiming the loss of Brady Manek will leave a huge hole.

“I’m not saying UNC can’t win the whole thing next season,” Goodman began. “All I am saying is this is still a team that will miss Brady Manek a ton, and also a team that was mediocre for much of the season before turning it on. Similar to UCLA a year ago.”

There was a time last season when North Carolina was considered to be on the bubble. Thanks to impressive wins down the stretch, including one over Duke, they got into the NCAA Tournament and were able to make the run.

As for the comparison to UCLA, the Bruins were who the Tar Heels beat in the Sweet 16 after making their own Final Four appearance in 2021. Davis and company will be hoping to do a little better compared to Nick Cronin’s squad and be the final team standing in March 2023.

Caleb Love announces North Carolina return

North Carolina’s Caleb Love announced on Sunday afternoon in a post on his Twitter page that he’s coming back to school for another year. He joins a number of other Tar Heel stars that have decided to come back to UNC for yet another season.

Love was a key piece in guiding the Tar Heels to their 2022 NCAA Championship game appearance against the Kansas Jayhawks. He delivered an epic three-point dagger for the ages against the Duke Blue Devils in the Final Four. Coming out of high school, Love was one of the most coveted prospects in America. He was rated as a five-star prospect and the No. 4 point guard in the country, according to the On3 Consensus Rankings for the 2020 cycle.

Love’s return to play college basketball is yet another win for NIL and its ability to keep some of the game’s biggest stars in college basketball for a little bit longer before they chase after NBA riches. In returning to Chapel Hill for one more run at a championship, Love joins his teammates Armando Bacot, RJ Davis, and Leaky Black. Brady Manek was the lone starter for the Tar Heels who won’t return next year after he exhausted his NCAA eligibility.