### North Carolina Keeps Its Cool in the Chaos: Tar Heels Refuse to Panic After Third Straight Loss in Raucous Assembly Hall
**By Lauren Brooks, NCAA.com Senior Writer**
*December 2, 2025 – Bloomington, IN*
BLOOMINGTON — The final horn sounded at 9:47 p.m. inside a deafening Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall, and the score read Indiana 84, North Carolina 79. Another night, another gut-punch loss for the Tar Heels. Their third in a row. Their fifth in seven games. A proud program that began the season ranked No. 7 now sits 5-6, staring at its worst 11-game start since 2001–02.
Yet inside the visiting locker room, the scene was eerily calm.
No chairs kicked. No whiteboards smashed. No pointed fingers. Just Hubert Davis, arms folded, telling his team the same thing he’s told reporters 20 minutes later: “We are not broken. We are close.”
That measured tone — almost defiant in its steadiness — is the story coming out of Chapel Hill right now. While message boards burn and national pundits sharpen their knives, the Tar Heels insist the sky is not falling. Not yet.
“We’ve lost three straight on the road against three teams that are a combined 29-4,” senior guard RJ Davis said, towel draped over his shoulders, still dripping sweat. “Everybody wants to act like we’re 0-11. We’re 5-6. We’ve got 20 regular-season games left and the best league in America still in front of us. I’m not hitting any panic buttons.”
The numbers, though, are hard to ignore.
After Tuesday’s loss in Bloomington — a game in which UNC led by 11 in the first half and by six with 7:12 remaining — the Tar Heels have now dropped consecutive road games to No. 8 Kansas (89-84), No. 14 Alabama (94-91), and now No. 18 Indiana. All three defeats came by single digits. All three featured second-half collapses that saw double-digit leads evaporate.
Indiana’s comeback was the most painful. Malik Reneau (24 points, 12 rebounds) and Mackenzie Mgbako (22 points) feasted on Carolina’s suddenly porous interior defense, while the Hoosiers’ crowd of 17,222 — the loudest Assembly Hall has sounded in years, according to IU officials — turned every loose ball into a 50-50 that felt 80-20.
Carolina missed its final eight shots from the floor. Elliot Cadeau, the sophomore point guard tasked with replacing RJ Davis minutes when the senior is on the bench, turned it over twice in the last 90 seconds. And Armando Bacot’s successor, freshman big man James Brown, fouled out with 1:38 left after a night spent chasing Reneau around the paint.
Yet the postgame vibe was anything but apocalyptic.
Hubert Davis gathered his team in the tunnel before they boarded the bus and delivered a message that multiple players repeated almost verbatim: “We just played 3-0’d the hardest road stretch any team in America will play all year. We didn’t get the results, but we got better. And we’re bringing that growth home.”
### The Data Behind the Calm
There’s evidence to support the lack of panic.
Despite the 5-6 record, KenPom still ranks North Carolina No. 19 nationally, with the No. 8-rated schedule played so far. The Tar Heels are 0-4 in Quad 1 games, but all four losses are to top-20 KenPom teams by an average of 6.5 points. Their three non-conference home wins — Michigan State, Dayton, and UCLA — remain résumé gold.
Offensively, Carolina is still elite: No. 9 in adjusted efficiency, No. 3 in effective field-goal percentage, No. 1 in two-point percentage. RJ Davis (22.8 ppg) and Cadeau (15.1 ppg, 7.1 apg) form the most productive returning backcourt in the country. Transfer guard Cade Tyson from Belmont has been everything advertised, shooting 44% from three on six attempts per game.
The issue — and everyone in the program acknowledges it — is defense. After finishing top-20 in adjusted defensive efficiency each of the last two seasons, UNC is currently No. 112. Opponents are shooting 52.4% on twos against the Heels, and Carolina ranks 298th nationally in defensive rebound rate.
“We’re not guarding the ball well enough, and we’re not finishing possessions,” Hubert Davis said bluntly. “That’s fixable. That’s coaching and effort. That’s not talent deficiency.”
### Voices from the Locker Room
Fifth-year forward Jae’Lyn Withers, who transferred in from Louisville and has started every game: “I’ve been on teams that were actually bad. This ain’t bad. We’re just young in some spots and stubborn in others. Three weeks of practice before Maui, we looked unbeatable. Three games on the road against bloodthirsty crowds, we looked human. The film doesn’t lie — we know exactly what to fix.”
Elliot Cadeau, who faced criticism for his rookie year for late-game mistakes, was especially defiant: “Y’all wrote us off last year when we started 7-4. Then we won the ACC Tournament. Write us off again. Please.”
Even the freshmen refused to flinch. Five-star wing Drake Powell, who had 14 points and four steals against Indiana’s length: “Coach keeps saying the season is a marathon. We just ran the hardest three miles of anybody. Now we get to go home, sleep in our own beds, and play in the Dean Dome for a month straight. I like our chances.”
### What Comes Next
North Carolina returns to Chapel Hill for a soft landing: home games against Georgia Tech (Dec. 6), American (Dec. 10), and La Salle (Dec. 14) before hosting UCLA in the CBS Sports Classic on Dec. 20. The Tar Heels then open ACC play at home against Louisville and SMU — two of the league’s bottom-tier teams per preseason projections.
In other words, December offers a lifeline. A 5-0 or even 4-1 month flips the record to 9-7 or 10-6 heading into January’s meat grinder (at Duke, at Clemson, home vs. Pitt and NC State).
Sources inside the program say the coaching staff has already scheduled individual film sessions for every rotation player this week, with a heavy emphasis on pick-up defense, closeout discipline, and transition accountability. There’s also talk of shortening the rotation — potentially moving Brown and fellow freshman big Ian Jackson to more situational roles until rebounding and rim protection improve.
### The Hubert Davis Factor
Perhaps the biggest reason for calm is the man in charge. In Year 4, Davis has earned capital. He took a preseason No. 19 team to the 2022 national title game as a rookie head coach, then followed it with a 2023 ACC regular-season title and a 2024 ACC Tournament championship despite losing four starters to the NBA.
Players repeatedly cite his even-keeled demeanor as the antidote to outside noise.
“Coach doesn’t ride the roller coaster,” RJ Davis said. “When we were 14-3 last year, he told us we weren’t as good as our record. Right now he’s telling us we’re not as bad as ours. I trust that.”
### The Bottom Line
North Carolina is bruised, not broken.
Three straight losses in enemy arenas that would rattle any team. A defense that needs urgent repair. A fan base teetering between concern and full meltdown.
But inside the locker room, the message is unanimous: We’ve been here before. We’ve climbed out before. And we’ll do it again.
As the team bus rolled out of Bloomington past midnight, one veteran player posted a simple message on his Instagram story that summed up the mood:
“3 in a row lost.
20+ to go.
See y’all in March.
For a program defined by resilience, that might be the loudest statement of all.
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