Heels Headed to Asheville for Maui Classic

Roy Williams and the Tar Heels are headed for Asheville for the relocated Maui Invitational. The Heels get things started on Monday, against UNLV.

The Runnin’ Rebels only have three returning scholarship players from last year, but Williams thinks that’s misleading. “They’ve also got a couple kids that were sitting there as transfers last year,” he said. “So it’s not like they’ve only been practicing for one month.”

“They’ve got five or six guys that have played for them,” Williams continued. “They had a tough start to their first game, because Montana came out and made eight of their first 12 threes. That sort of hits anybody right in the eye. I think they got better. They were much better in the second half. TJ (Otzelberger) has got some new guys with Bryce (Hamilton), who’s a big-time scorer—first-team all-league, maybe preseason player of the year. He’s the kind of guy we’ve got to do a good job on.”

Carolina will play three games in three days, which will be a test for the young team.

“We’ll find out lot more about the team,“ Williams said. “For one thing, it does give the opportunity to test our depth. We’re going to try to play more than five guys. We always have. Right now, I’d like to keep this depth all year. Last year, we had no depth. Three games in three days, we’ll get a chance for a lot of people to play.”

Williams is packing a Hawaiian shirt for the trip.

“I’ll probably wear a coaching shirt and probably wear one Hawaiian shirt as well, to make me think of the good times we’ve had in Maui,” he said.

Add us as a preferred source on Google