North Carolina’s exhibition slate has already put a few uncomfortable truths on the table.
With Michael Malone in his first season on the bench and 11 newcomers trying to mesh, the Tar Heels were always going to spend October sorting through more questions than answers. Two tuneups in, North Carolina has beaten USC and lost to Indiana, and the biggest takeaways are less about what the Tar Heels did well than where the trouble spots might be.
The most obvious one has been Brown. Bringing in the former Utah guard was a major piece of the roster build after he averaged 19.9 points per game last season.
North Carolina expected his scoring to show up fast. It hasn’t.
Through the two exhibitions, the 6-foot-3, 180-pound guard has posted 12 points, five assists and four rebounds while shooting 5-of-14 from the field.
What stands out most is the finishing. Brown has struggled to convert at the rim, and that matters because his 2025 three-point mark was 32.7 percent.
If he isn’t scoring efficiently inside, the pressure only grows on his outside shot to carry more of the load. He can still grow into the kind of scorer the Tar Heels need, but these first two outings have been quiet.
The rebounding picture is just as uneasy. North Carolina had no trouble controlling the glass against USC, but that game didn’t reveal much about how the team would hold up against a bigger front line.
Indiana did. The Hoosiers pushed the Tar Heels around on the boards, finishing with a 53-31 rebounding edge.
They grabbed 20 offensive rebounds and turned them into 17 second-chance points.
That kind of size is closer to what North Carolina will see in the ACC. Duke, Louisville and Virginia all bring frontcourt groups that are described as above-average to elite, and Indiana’s forwards and centers don’t even rise to that level. For North Carolina to be effective on the glass, Cameron Fens needs to be eligible this season.
Malone’s roster construction has clearly leaned on the backcourt, with Brown, Matt Able and Neoklis Avdalas as the main pieces. Shooting was already a sore spot last season, when Henri Veesaar was the team’s best shooter. This group has more options on the wing and more players who can make shots from deep, but the early results haven’t matched the paper version.
Across the two exhibitions, North Carolina has shot 18-of-53 from three-point range. That number can work in spurts, especially if the Tar Heels are able to spread the floor around their guards and wings.
But with questions still hanging over center and little obvious physicality inside, perimeter shooting can’t just be a bonus. It may have to be a lifeline.
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UNCs Bowl Picture Just Produced A Matchup Tar Heels Would Notice
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Penn State is one of the speculative opponents that has surfaced, which would be the kind of matchup North Carolina would notice immediately given the profile of the game and the attention it would bring. Nothing is official yet, and the final destination will still depend on how the Tar Heels finish and how the bowl selections shake out, but the possibility alone gives the stretch run a little extra weight. [Read more 🡒]
UNC May Need To Survive Syracuse Shorthanded Again
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Tre Miller has already been ruled out, and North Carolina enters the week with eight players out for the game before kickoff even arrives. Syracuse has its own availability issues, with five players ruled out, but the Tar Heels are the ones facing the bigger challenge of making sure a long injury list does not leave them short-handed in another critical spot. [Read more 🡒]
No. 2 UNC Faces A Huge ACC Test At Dorrance Field
No. 2 Carolina gets one of the biggest tests on its league schedule Friday night when No. 7 Stanford comes to Dorrance Field for a matchup that should tell plenty about where the Tar Heels stand in the ACC race. The game will stream on ACC Network, and it arrives with Carolina sitting atop the conference standings, buoyed by a strong overall record and a home run of results that has made Dorrance one of the tougher places to visit in the league.
Bella Devey has been one of the headliners in that surge, leading the ACC in goals, while several other Tar Heels have already picked up conference honors and national recognition for their work. Carolina also owns the edge in the series with Stanford, but this is the kind of late-season matchup that can tighten quickly, especially with both teams carrying top-10 status into a high-stakes Friday night setting. [Read more 🡒]