𝘽𝙧𝙚𝙖𝙠𝙞𝙣𝙜: 𝙃𝙤𝙡𝙙𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝘾𝙤𝙪𝙧𝙩: 𝙐𝙉𝘾 𝘽𝙖𝙨𝙠𝙚𝙩𝙗𝙖𝙡𝙡 𝙍𝙚𝙫𝙞𝙨𝙞𝙩𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙒𝙞𝙡𝙙 𝙏𝙞𝙢𝙚𝙨

### Holding Court: UNC Basketball Revisiting Wild Times

 

**By David Glenn**

*Chapelboro.com*

*December 1, 2025*

 

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. — As the calendar flips to December and the North Carolina Tar Heels men’s basketball team savors a perfect 6-0 start to the 2025-26 season, the echoes of history feel louder than ever in the Dean E. Smith Center. Freshman sensation Caleb Wilson, the Atlanta phenom who’s already dunking on defenders like it’s a layup drill, has thrust himself into conversations about UNC’s most unforgettable freshman leaders. His explosive debut—22 points on 8-of-10 shooting, four boards, three assists, and a highlight-reel block—drew raves from alumni like John Henson, who tweeted, “I don’t think there has been a better 4-minute freshman debut in the history of UNC than Caleb Wilson—wow.” But in the glow of this early promise, Tar Heel Nation can’t help but revisit the wilder chapters of its past: those chaotic, heart-stopping seasons when young guns lit up the court amid turmoil that tested the soul of the program.

 

It’s a tale as old as Tar Heel basketball itself—one of glory forged in fire. UNC’s ledger boasts six national titles (1957, 1982, 1993, 2005, 2009, 2017), 21 Final Four trips, and a .735 all-time winning percentage that’s the envy of every blue-blood program. Yet beneath the polished legacy lies a history of “wild times”: coaching upheavals, freshman phenoms carrying impossible loads, buzzer-beaters that bent the laws of physics, and off-court drama that could fill a Netflix docuseries. This season, with Hubert Davis’ squad eyeing a return to elite status amid NIL chaos and transfer portal whirlwinds, those stories aren’t just nostalgia—they’re blueprints for survival. As Davis himself noted in a recent radio spot, “The old model for Carolina basketball just doesn’t work anymore. It’s not sustainable.” But oh, how the wild ones sustained it.

 

Let’s rewind to 2002-03, a season that remains the gold standard for UNC chaos. Enter Matt Doherty, a first-time head coach thrust into the fray after Bill Guthridge’s abrupt retirement following the 2000 national title. Doherty, a former Tar Heel assistant under Dean Smith, inherited a roster brimming with talent but zero margin for error. The leading scorer? Freshman guard Rashad McCants, a 6-foot-5 scoring machine from Asheville with a jumper like a laser and an ego to match. McCants averaged 20 points per game as a rookie, torching nets from deep (42.6% on threes) and dropping 26 in a rout of then-No. 3 Duke. He was electric, erratic, and utterly unpredictable—a human highlight reel one possession, a turnover machine the next.

 

But the wildness wasn’t just on the court. Doherty’s inexperience showed in a 19-11 regular season marred by eight ACC losses, including a 20-point drubbing by hated rival NC State. Off the hardwood, whispers of locker-room fractures grew louder. McCants, known for his sharp tongue, clashed with coaches and teammates alike, his post-career gripes (claiming in interviews that UNC “held him back”) still souring relationships with alumni today. The Heels scraped into the NCAA Tournament as an 8-seed, only to bow out in the second round to Texas. It was a season of squandered potential, emblematic of the program’s first true post-Smith crisis. Doherty was fired after a dismal 8-20 follow-up in 2003-04—the Tar Heels’ worst record since 1961, snapping 31 straight 20-win seasons and a 35-year streak of top-three ACC finishes. Fans chanted for Roy Williams’ return from Kansas; when he finally came home in 2003, it felt like salvation.

 

Fast-forward three years to 2005-06, and the pendulum swung wildly the other way. Williams, the Carolina legend turned Jayhawk icon, rebuilt with a freshman anchor who embodied the opposite of McCants: Tyler Hansbrough, a 6-foot-9 bulldog from Poplar Bluff, Missouri, whose motor ran hotter than a Durham rivalry game. “Psycho T,” as he’d soon be dubbed, led the Heels with 16.6 points and 7.1 rebounds as a rookie, diving for loose balls like they were family heirlooms. This wasn’t just scoring; it was soul—Hansbrough’s relentless energy infected a squad that started 15-1 but hit the skids, dropping to 11-5 overall and 3-3 in the ACC by late January amid injuries and integration woes.

 

The wild turnaround? A 10-1 finish to the regular season, capped by a 20-point demolition of Duke in Cameron Indoor. Hansbrough’s grit powered it all, including a 30-point explosion against Virginia Tech. UNC snared the ACC regular-season crown, reached the tournament as a No. 1 seed, and bowed out in the second round to Donovan’s Florida Gators—future champs themselves. It was vintage Tar Heel resilience, the kind that turned near-disasters into top-10 finishes (#10 in the final polls). Hansbrough, low-maintenance and unbreakable, went on to become UNC’s all-time leading scorer (3,285 points) and a national player of the year. His freshman year proved that wild times don’t have to end in wreckage; they can forge legends.

 

These polar-opposite freshman-led odysseys mirror the broader turbulence of UNC’s history. Consider the 1923-24 squad, retroactively crowned national champs for its perfect 26-0 run under coach Norman Shepard—a feat that included a 41-20 dismantling of Kentucky in the rivalry’s debut. Or the 1960s dynasty under Smith, where civil rights-era protests raged off-campus while Larry Brown and Charlie Scott integrated the roster, leading to back-to-back Final Fours in 1967-68 and a ’68 title-game loss to UCLA’s Lew Alcindor. Smith’s teams were wild in their precision: 27 tournament trips, two titles (1982 with Worthy, Perkins, and a sophomore Jordan; 1993 with Eric Montross anchoring the paint), and streaks like 39 straight .500-or-better seasons from 1962-2001.

 

The 1980s and ’90s brought more frenzy. Who forgets the 1991 Sweet 16 upset of Indiana, sparked by a King Rice miss that haunted him for decades? Or the 1997 ACC Tournament semis, where Antawn Jamison’s 34 points buried Duke in overtime? Wildest of all might be 2009-10 under Roy: a 20-14 regular season plagued by portal precursors (early NBA jumps) and a second-round NIT exit, sandwiched between titles in ’05 and ’09. Yet from those ashes rose Harrison Barnes and a reloaded roster for 2011’s Elite Eight run.

 

Today’s Tar Heels channel that spirit. Davis, entering his fifth year with a 101-45 record, has navigated NIL upheavals that saw top recruits like 2025’s AJ Dybantsa spurn Chapel Hill for BYU’s deep pockets. The 2025-26 roster, unveiled in August, blends vets like Luka Bogavac with high-upside newcomers: Wilson (Georgia’s Gatorade Player of the Year, averaging 21.7 points in high school) and transfers like Henri Veesaar, who just erupted for a career-high 24 points and 13 rebounds in Friday’s 85-70 thriller over St. Bonaventure at the Fort Myers Tip-Off.<grok:render card_id=”70531d” card_type=”citation_card” type=”render_inline_citation”>

<argument name=”citation_id”>2</argument>

</grok:render> Veesaar’s dominance—hitting the glass hard after offseason drills with assistant Sean May—sparked a second-half rally from a halftime deficit, echoing Hansbrough’s late surges. UNC limited the Bonnies (5-1 entering) to 10 offensive boards on 41 misses, well below their top-10 national mark.<grok:render card_id=”652210″ card_type=”citation_card” type=”render_inline_citation”>

<argument name=”citation_id”>4</argument>

</grok:render> Wilson added 18, his above-the-rim athleticism drawing MJ comparisons, while Bogavac dished four assists in a balanced attack that shot 28-of-32 from the line.

 

This 6-0 start—the best since 2016-17’s 7-0 opener—feels fragile yet familiar. Wins over Navy (73-61, with Wilson and Bogavac combining for 27) and earlier exhibitions masked bench inconsistencies; a players-only meeting post-Navy addressed “lackluster” efforts.<grok:render card_id=”163f0b” card_type=”citation_card” type=”render_inline_citation”>

<argument name=”citation_id”>4</argument>

</grok:render> The schedule stiffens: road tilts at Dayton and Tennessee loom before ACC play against Duke, Syracuse, and a gauntlet of Clemson, Louisville, and Pitt at home. Recruiting buzz adds fuel—five-star Dylan Mingo, No. 6 in the 2026 class, named UNC a finalist after an official visit, edging out Washington, Penn State, and Baylor.<grok:render card_id=”8847e3″ card_type=”citation_card” type=”render_inline_citation”>

<argument name=”citation_id”>3</argument>

</grok:render> A government shutdown derailed his initial trip, but Davis’ staff rescheduled swiftly, underscoring the program’s adaptability in this “volatile transfer environment.”<grok:render card_id=”65c423″ card_type=”citation_card” type=”render_inline_citation”>

<argument name=”citation_id”>8</argument>

</grok:render>

 

Davis, who caught “holy hell” for last season’s NCAA snub, is modernizing aggressively: hiring a basketball-specific GM to rival Duke’s model, as he admitted post a 87-70 Cameron thrashing in February.<grok:render card_id=”18f48d” card_type=”citation_card” type=”render_inline_citation”>

<argument name=”citation_id”>13</argument>

</grok:render> “You need a bigger staff to maintain things,” he said, eyeing length and continuity after portal losses. Wilson’s emergence—he’s already on the Wooden Award preseason watch list—revives UNC’s NBA pipeline, dormant since the Zion Williamson era. The Heels have produced 61 pros, but recent drafts yielded just one first-rounder (Coby White, 2019). Wilson, with his 6-foot-9 frame and 7-foot wingspan, could change that.

 

As December dawns, the Smith Center—nearing its 40th anniversary—pulses with memories of wilder games: the 1993 21-point Florida State comeback (Donald Williams’ 19 points), Hubert Davis’ 30 in a 22-point Wake rally over the Deacs, or Pete Chilcutt’s dunk-capped 84-81 upset of No. 3 Kentucky in the Dean Dome’s 1986 debut.<grok:render card_id=”dd1c14″ card_type=”citation_card” type=”render_inline_citation”>

<argument name=”citation_id”>24</argument>

</grok:render> Those nights remind us: UNC thrives in the storm. McCants’ volatility birthed Hansbrough’s steadiness; Doherty’s flop paved Williams’ dynasty. Now, with Wilson posterizing foes and Veesaar owning the paint, Davis’ Heels stand at a crossroads. The wild times? They’re here again. But if history holds, Chapel Hill will emerge stronger, bluer, and unbreakable.

 

Will this be the season UNC reclaims its throne? Or another chapter in the chaos? One thing’s certain: Tar Heel basketball doesn’t do ordinary. It does epic. And as Wilson leaps for another oop, the ghosts of McCants and Hansbrough nod approvingly from the rafters.

 

*David Glenn (DavidGlennShow.com, @DavidGlennShow) is an award-winning author, broadcaster, and UNC Wilmington lecturer who has covered Tar Heel sports since 1987. Follow Chapelboro for more Holding Court columns and local coverage. Chapelboro.com supports free journalism—donate today.*

 

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