When legendary North Carolina coach Roy Williams announced his retirement last spring, longtime assistant and alum Hubert Davis was offered the job and named successor. And although his first year at the helm can be described as tumultuous, the 51-year-old erased all doubts about his candidacy and proved to be the right leader this past weekend.
Davis became the first men's coach since Bill Guthridge in 1998 to lead a team to the Final Four in his first season, as the Tar Heels crushed Cinderella darling Saint Peter's, 69-49, in the East Regional final on Sunday. Earlier in the month, North Carolina was widely considered a bubble team. But a shocking upset of Duke at Cameron Indoor Stadium ignited a special tournament run, and they'll soon face their archrivals again, this time on the biggest and brightest stage.
"Carolina has always had top-15 caliber talent," CBS Sports hoops insider Jon Rothstein told The DA Show on Tuesday. "One of things that we've seen over the last month is, their top-four players -- RJ Davis, Caleb Love, Brady Manek, and Armando Bacot -- have been good enough to match up with any quartet in college basketball. UNC has reached a different level over the last month...
"Anytime somebody's a first-time head coach, they're obviously going to go through a swirl of emotions, out of the gate. If you look at that situation with Hubert Davis, he gets the job -- he's never been in a scenario where he's led his own program. To go from being 18-8, after losing to Pittsburgh in February, to making a Final Four, it's an incredible turnaround in a 30-day span."
North Carolina, which finished the regular season with a 23-8 record, simply had its way against Saint Peter's from the opening tip. They scored twice as many points during the first half (38-19), owned a commanding 27-point lead midway through the second, and limited the Cinderella hopeful to 18 buckets. Armando Bacot recorded a team-high 20 points with a whopping 22 boards.
For the first time in history, the Tar Heels and Blue Devils will face each other in the NCAA Tournament, and the winner of Saturday's game (8:49 ET tip) will advance to the national championship and earn long-lasting bragging rights. According to FiveThirtyEight's projections, North Carolina currently has a 38-percent chance to beat its longtime foe for the second time this season.
The entire college basketball conversation between Rothstein and DA can be accessed in the audio player above.
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