UNC’s latest NCAA faceplant shows a brand that barely knows itself

North Carolina, one of the most recognizable brands in college basketball, barely recognizes itself.

The Tar Heels blew a 19-point second-half lead and lost to VCU 82-78 in overtime — the largest comeback in a first-round NCAA Tournament game and the second-biggest rally in tournament history, behind only No. 7 seed Nevada’s 22-point comeback against No. 2 seed Cincinnati in 2018.

North Carolina led 70-56 with just over seven minutes remaining and had clear control of the game. The Tar Heels were killing VCU in transition, were aggressive getting to the rim and had an 18-1 assist-to-turnover ratio through the first 29 minutes.

VCU went on a 12-0 run over the next four minutes to reduce UNC’s lead to just two points and eventually tied the game at 75-75 on a driving layup from Hill with 15 seconds left in regulation, as he blew past Derek Dixon with ease for the bucket. That gave the Rams all the momentum going into overtime before they eventually pulled out the win.

In the final 7:45 of regulation, the Tar Heels went 0-for-9 from the field and 4-for-9 at the free-throw line. Making matters worse, they turned the ball over seven times in the second half and overtime and did not record a single assist in the final 16 minutes of game time.

When asked what happened in UNC’s historic collapse, head coach Hubert Davis answered with a question of his own: “What do you mean?”

It fit the night. Once again, Davis stopped short of real accountability. Asked if he thought his team was gassed down the stretch, he pushed back.

“I did not. I didn’t,” he said.

Pressed on why he stuck with essentially a six-man rotation instead of going nine deep, Davis didn’t move there, either.

“Because that was my decision.”

That’s not a good look for the head coach of one of college basketball’s premier programs. But it’s also a symptom of something bigger: North Carolina has been losing its way for a while, long before Davis took over for Roy Williams.

Carolina has lost its way

Since UNC’s run to the national title game in 2022, the Tar Heels missed the NCAA Tournament entirely in 2023, bounced back with a Sweet 16 in 2024 and then crashed out with back-to-back first-round exits the last two seasons.

This is also  the third time in the last four NCAA Tournament trips that UNC has gone one-and-done, a skid that began in Williams’ final season in 2020-21.

You have to go back to 1978-80 to find a similar low, when the Tar Heels were bounced in their first game three straight years. That stretch was part of what was then the worst NCAA Tournament run in program history, with UNC losing its opener in four of five seasons from 1976 to 1980.

In in its history, North Carolina has won 48 of its 50 NCAA Tournament games when leading by 10 or more points at halftime. In quite a coincidence, both losses have come under Davis — to VCU on Thursday night and to Kansas in the 2022 national championship game.

UNC has not won an ACC tournament title since 2016 — a full decade. Since the 2019-20 season, the Tar Heels are 157-84 with no ACC tournament titles, one regular-season title, three first-round NCAA exits and two seasons with no postseason play at all.

The one true bright spot was 2021-22, when the Tar Heels beat Duke in Coach K’s final home game and reached the national championship. But even that night in New Orleans ended with another blown lead — a 15-point halftime advantage erased by Kansas.

All of it points to a larger problem: UNC is behind the times, especially in the NIL era. The school did not hire a general manager until this past offseason, when it brought in Jim Tanner.

Duke, meanwhile, has had a general manager in place since Jon Scheyer replaced Mike Krzyzewski in 2022, and the Blue Devils have hovered near the top of both the AP Top 25 poll and the recruiting rankings. It doesn’t help UNC’s case that Duke has also won two ACC tournament titles and made a Final Four run last season.

Even after its legendary coach called it a career, Duke kept winning. UNC, on the other hand, has struggled in the post-Williams era.

Duke has handled the NIL era with far more poise than UNC. The Blue Devils recognized early that brand alone wouldn’t be enough — a miscalculation Carolina clearly made. Yes, the biggest brands have the deepest pockets for players looking to cash in, but they can also be the most chaotic, the slowest to adapt and the least prepared for a completely new model of college athletics.

That’s what has happened in Chapel Hill, and Davis has not navigated it well. He might have been an ideal choice a decade ago, before NIL and the portal reshaped the sport. Now, the job demands something different.

Significant changes are needed

If UNC’s power brokers are truly alarmed by the state of Carolina basketball, they really have two choices.

The first is to move on from Davis — but only with a real plan. You cannot enter a coaching search like a headless chicken. We’ve already seen what that looks like elsewhere: Penn State was one of the first programs to fire its head football coach, James Franklin, yet it was the last to hire a replacement.

The second, and most realistic, path is to keep Davis for at least one more year — but only with sweeping changes throughout the program’s inner workings. Overhaul the staff, modernize the operation, fix what’s broken. If the same issues are still there after that, then it’s time to move on.

That plan may not satisfy an impatient fan base, but it would give UNC something it badly needs: time. Time to identify the right successor, build a coherent plan and make sure the foundation is sound whenever the keys are finally handed to someone else.

Either way, Carolina basketball needs a massive reboot and a culture shift, whether Davis is on the sideline or not.

This is North Carolina we’re talking about. Only UCLA and Kentucky have more national titles, and no program has more total wins, NCAA Tournament appearances or Final Four trips than the Tar Heels.

For decades, Carolina wasn’t just a brand in college basketball — it was the brand. Carolina blue, the argyle stripes, the interlocking NC and, later, the Jumpman logo all symbolized a standard — one the program met six times. It meant something.

Now, much of that sheen is gone. UNC looks less like an institution and more like just another program. Another team. Another name on the bracket. The interlocking NC is only a logo. The Jumpman that once felt exclusive to Chapel Hill is on a growing list of uniforms.

The Tar Heels can keep selling the ‘Carolina Way,’ but until they start living it again, the rest of college basketball will treat it like a slogan, not a standard.

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This article originally appeared on Tar Heels Wire: UNC Basketball: Historic collapse vs/ VCU raises questions for program