UNC basketball items from last week.
- UNC added another non-conference game to the schedule of a high profile nature. UNC and Texas have renewed their series for two more season, this time playing home-and-home instead of at neutral sites. The Heels host first with the Longhorns coming to Chapel Hill on December 21st. Here is a glance of what UNC's non-conference slate looks like based on available information(via Inside Carolina)November 11: vs Michigan St on the USS Carl Vinson
November 13: at UNC Asheville(opener in UNCA's new arena)
November 25: vs South Carolina in Las Vegas Invitational
November 26: vs USC or UNLV in LVI
November 30: vs Wisconsin in ACC/Big Ten Challenge
December 21: vs Texas
TBA: at Kentucky
TBA: vs Long Beach St.Texas is not being seen as a ranked team in the very early top 25 rankings put out by the college basketball writers having taken a huge hit from NBA defections. - The NC Pro Am is underway in Durham. Several Tar Heels are participating albeit on different teams. The rosters can be found here. This is the breakdown of UNC players.Triangle Gastroenterology: Harrison Barnes, John Henson, P.J. Hairston with Jerry Stackhouse as the coach. This team also lists John Wall on the roster which make them sick on variety of levels.
Sheraton Imperial: Dexter Strickland and Leslie McDonald. Duke players Kyrie Irving, Andre Dawkins and Josh Hairston are also on the team.
20/20: Justin Watts, James Michael McAdoo and Desmond Hubert along with former Heel David Noel.Unlike last year when there were some clear UNC vs NCSU games, the teams are somewhat more mixed. The next games are on July 7th. Unfortunately it is not know ahead of time which players will actually show up. If you do attend the games at NC Central, the word is go early because they test the patience of the Durham Fire Marshal on a regular basis. - Kendall Marshall spent the weekend with Stillman White. He apparently went to the beach for the first time(ever?) and got stung by a jellyfish. He then found a J.J. Redick Duke jersey in White's closet and posted a pic on Twitter. On what I can gather from Twitter there seems to be an concerted effort to build team chemistry. I don't think these guys are content to "let it happen." They appear to be very intentional about it and the freshmen seem to be fitting right in. After a couple of seasons of turmoil it will be nice to know everyone on this team wants to be in Chapel Hill, is on the same page with Roy Williams and like each other. Winning a national title is difficult enough, having the team chemistry covered before the season starts is one less thing to worry about.