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This is a little like Black Friday and the start of the Christmas season.
CBS Sports rolled out the first many basketball season previews yesterday from the top 100 player list to conference and Final Four picks. First up, the top 100 which has two Tar Heels on it, James Michael McAdoo at 13th and Reggie Bullock at 53rd.
13. James Michael McAdoo, 6-9, 230, PF, Soph., North Carolina
This is McAdoo’s chance to shine. Tyler Zeller and John Henson are both gone, meaning McAdoo will be the go-to-guy inside. During stretches last season, McAdoo showed flashes of a breakout season. -- J.B.
53. Reggie Bullock, 6-7, 205, SG, Jr., North Carolina
Bullock was never needed to be a go-to-guy offensively last season, but he should step up this season. He's an excellent shooter with athleticism who can fill it up in a hurry. -- J.B.
The argument can be made that McAdoo is too low, especially when you look at CBS' All-American teams where McAdoo shows up on the third team. You could argue that McAdoo is still an unknown commodity of sorts except that goes out the window when it comes to ranking two true freshman in the top ten. Ultimately, if you pinned any of these experts down, they would say the difference between 10 spots in the top 20 is probably not that great. McAdoo can make his case on the court and hopefully take this sort of thing as motivation.
In terms of overall predictions, a panel of Jeff Goodman, Doug Gottlieb, Gary Parrish, Matt Norlander and Jeff Borzello tossed out some conference and Final Four picks. In the ACC, Goodman and Parrish trolled the heck out of NC State fans and picked UNC to win the conference. Gottlieb and Norlander went with Duke and Borzello was the lone member of this crew going with NC State. No ACC team was picked for the Final Four in these predictions. If that were to happen it would be the first time since 1958-1961 the ACC has gone three straight seasons without a representative in the Final Four. The ACC has gone two straight seasons without a Final Four team four times since 1961.
In case you were wondering, UNC basketball begins the season one month from today.