UNC basketball stays put in updated ESPN way-too-early top 25

In the last week, the transfer portal for winter sports officially closed as players had to make final decisions on their future. For the North Carolina Tar Heels’ basketball program, they saw guard D’Marco Dunn leave the program right before the deadline.

Dunn spent two seasons at North Carolina but opted to transfer out with the Tar Heels adding Cormac Ryan and potentially getting Elliot Cadeau a year earlier than expected. The competition at guard will be fierce for the Tar Heels and the hope is that the position can produce better results than last season.

With the portal closing and rosters changing, ESPN has updated its “way-too-early top 25” for the upcoming season. The biggest change was Miami moving up four spots from 19 to 15 but aside from that, there wasn’t a lot of movement. That included the Tar Heels who stayed put at No. 20:

Hubert Davis started the offseason with two anchors: R.J. Davis at one guard spot and Armando Bacot down low. He then went out and surrounded his two returning stars with intriguing complementary players. Notre Dame transfer Cormac Ryan is a veteran shooter, while Harrison Ingram from Stanford is a versatile wing. The Tar Heels have plenty of perimeter options already, but top-10 2024 commits Ian Jackson and Elliot Cadeau could still opt to reclassify.

Now, these are just very early rankings and things will change between now and the start of next season. However, it’s nice to see at least one publication think UNC will be a better team than last season.