Tuesday was the day that Hubert Davis was introduced as the new head coach of the North Carolina Tar Heels and originally, Armando Bacot was believed to be one of the current Tar Heel players in attendance for the introduction of the Tar Heels new head coach. While Bacot would confirm that he was in fact not in attendance for Coach Davis introductory press conference, he would release some even bigger news later in the evening via social media.
Shortly before 6:00 PM on Tuesday night, Bacot announced that after talking with Roy WIlliams and Hubert Davis, he would be entering the NBA Draft. The sophomore forward confirmed in the post that he will not sign with an agent, but will instead use the opportunity to receive feedback from scouts to determine what his ultimate decision will be.
As a sophomore this season, Bacot took a significant step forward, especially on the offensive end. He led the team in points per game (12.3), rebounds per game (7.8), blocks per game (0.9) and field goal percentage (.628), becoming the first Tar Heel to shoot over 60% from the field since 2015-16 and posting the high field goal percentage since Brandan Wright in 2006-07.Both the points per game and field goal percentage numbers being major improvement from his quietly strong freshman season.
This is another tough loss in the Tar Heel frontcourt that has now lost five players from this season's loaded group. The team is now faced with the possibility of losing all of it’s frontcourt production from this past season if Garrison Brooks is to move on and not play his super senior season in Chapel Hill. As Coach Davis said in his press conference on Tuesday afternoon, though, he is hoping that he can convince Walker Kessler, who entered the transfer portal back on March 22nd, to return to the team. That would be huge for a team that right now is in need of bodies in the frontcourt, something we never thought we’d be saying about this unit that was supposed to be the strength of the team once again heading into next year. Instead, this will be the area that will be a major focus for Coach Davis and his staff in this offseason.