Scholarships After Dark: UNC offers five-star 2020 PG

Well, everybody buckle up. The UNC coaching staff has started handing out scholarship offers to the class of 2020. Point guard Jeremy Roach became the first high school junior to receive an offer from UNC since Day’Ron Sharpe committed earlier this year. Tar Heel Illustrated dropped the news late on Thursday night. Due to Williams’ propensity to offer most of his scholarships late at night, we here at Tar Heel Blog affectionately call these offers “Scholarships After Dark”.

The consensus five-star point guard hails from Alexandria, VA where he plays for Paul VI Catholic High School. Standing at 6’2 and 170 lbs, Roach is an aggressive playmaker who possesses the ability to get to the rim and attack in transition. An explosive first step may be his biggest weapon, with his court vision being a close second. In other words, he has the potential to be a classic UNC point guard.

As he continues to grow, Roach could develop into the versatile “combo” guard that has become more coveted by the UNC coaching staff. Check out these highlights.

Playing for Team Takeover, he averaged 7.3 points and 3.1 assists at July’s NIKE Peach Jam. Not spectacular, but considering he was a year younger than most of the competition, that’s a solid showing. Roy Williams and his staff saw plenty of Team Takeover this past summer when they followed recent UNC commit Armando Bacot. The staff clearly saw something in the rising junior’s game that caught their eye to offer this early in the process.

Rivals ranks Roach as the 16th overall player in his class. ESPN slots him at 17th, and 247 Sports lists him at 15th (but 11th in their composite). All three consider him a five-star talent and a top-3 point guard. Roach has also been with Team USA for three years, winning two gold medals along the way.

With so much uncertainty in the class of 2019, the class of the 2020 has been slow to take shape. At a minimum, Seventh Woods will have graduated by the time the summer of 2020 arrives. Jeremiah Francis’ long-term recovery timeline is still unknown, and Coby White is likely not staying at UNC for more than two years. Regardless of what becomes of the 2019 recruiting class, the point guard position will still be lacking depth.

Roach may be the first step in filling that void.