Covering Carolina athletics beyond men’s basketball and football, with dedicated reporting on women’s basketball and baseball, in addition to covering other sports that rarely draw media attention
CHAPEL HILL — Carolina traded offensive punches with the nation’s top-ranked team, only to be undone by the game’s only turnover. Miami’s strip-sack of Billy Edwards Jr. with 5½ minutes left led to the game-clinching score as the No. 1 Hurricanes survived with a 38–35 victory Saturday night at Kenan Stadium.
On a Halloween night when clocks turn back an hour, North Carolina tried to turn back the clock 22 years to one of the biggest upsets in program history: a win over top-five Miami in Kenan Stadium. And for much of Saturday’s game, it looked like there was a chance, until another turn-back-the-clock moment.
Here’s a look at No. 12 UNC’s season opener on Monday at Oui-Play Paris against No. 21 Oklahoma.
Individual success continues to come easy for Caleb Wilson in the NBA, but as his Chicago Bulls continue to struggle, he’s having a hard time dealing with losses. Wilson poured in 23 points, making a season-high six 3-pointers, with five rebounds, four assists and two blocks on Friday, but in a 125–111 road loss to the Boston Celtics that dropped Chicago to 1–5 with its fourth consecutive loss.
DURHAM — Seventy days after Duke dominated North Carolina in an August field hockey scrimmage at Williams Field, the roles were reversed for one half. A young Tar Heels team that has endured plenty of adversity since then looked more like a championship team. Sensational fifth-year forward Ryleigh Heck scored two goals, and Carolina held on for a 2–1 victory to earn the top seed in next week’s ACC tournament in Chapel Hill.
Here’s a look at UNC’s season opener on Monday at the Smith Center against Western Carolina in Coach Michael Malone’s regular-season debut as the Tar Heels’ coach.
CHAPEL HILL — No. 2 North Carolina has played nearly every match without its full roster, but that hasn’t mattered with the talent that Coach Damon Nahas has at his disposal. The Tar Heels showed off their impressive depth again Thursday in a dominant 2–0 senior-night victory over SMU at Dorrance Field.
Here are North Carolina’s cumulative statistics from the three exhibition games, an 88–70 win over Southern Cal on Oct. 9 in Greensboro, an 76–58 loss to Indiana on Oct. 18 in Indianapolis and an 89–82 home win Tuesday over Charlotte.
CHAPEL HILL — North Carolina found enough offense to beat Charlotte on Tuesday, but Coach Michael Malone was left concerned about how much offense his team handed the 49ers. The 49ers scored 23 points off Carolina turnovers in the Tar Heels’ 89–82 overtime victory, extending a preseason problem that UNC must solve. With the exhibitions finished and Western Carolina visiting Monday for the season opener, Malone’s assessment went beyond the relief of escaping with a win.
CHAPEL HILL — Michael Malone has spent the preseason coaching around a hole in the middle of his roster and made his frustration known. After North Carolina escaped with an 89–82 overtime exhibition win Tuesday at the Smith Center over Charlotte, Malone talked about a player who wasn’t in uniform for any of the three exhibition games.
CHAPEL HILL — A photo of his late aunt hung from Terrence Brown’s chain as he sat at a table after Tuesday’s game, with his Athlete’s Bible resting beside him. Both were reminders of a year the Utah transfer guard said has taken a lot from him and pushed him closer to his faith.
CHAPEL HILL — If exhibition games are a chance for teams to learn from their mistakes, North Carolina has plenty of issues to sort out. Sloppy, choppy offense with weak rebounding, mental mistakes, poor perimeter shooting and adventures on inbounds passes were some of the problems the Tar Heels had to overcome before they pulled out an 89–82 overtime victory Tuesday over Charlotte at the Smith Center.
Hubert Davis is returning to television after 14 seasons as part of the Carolina’s men’s basketball program. Davis, who UNC fired on March 24 as head coach, is joining TNT Sports as a regular contributor to its men’s college basketball game and studio coverage during the 2026–27 season, the network announced Tuesday.
North Carolina’s 31–30 overtime loss to Syracuse on Saturday left the Tar Heels two victories short of bowl eligibility, but seven postseason projections still have them headed to four possible bowls, with six potential opponents. The Duke’s Mayo Bowl in Charlotte and Military Bowl in Annapolis, Md., are the most frequently projected destinations for UNC (4–3, 2–2 ACC).
Caleb Wilson’s impressive start to his NBA career continued Monday night, even as the Chicago Bulls endured their most lopsided loss of the young season on a day that RJ Davis joined a G League camp.
