Hubert Davis hopes UNC basketball defense in SMU loss is 'one-game thing' for Tar Heels

In the last 29 years, UNC basketball has only produced one defensive performance worse than its showing at SMU in the first ACC road game of the 2025-26 season. According to KenPom efficiency ratings, the Tar Heels’ 97-83 loss to the Mustangs in Dallas was the second-worst defensive output since 1997. The only game in which the Tar Heels logged a worse showing in defensive efficiency and effective field-goal percentage defense was at Pitt in 2015. “I hope it was a one-game thing. It came in many different directions. I couldn’t point at one particular area,” UNC coach Hubert Davis said Jan. 5 during the first ACC coaches Zoom teleconference of the 2025-26 season. “I thought our one-on-one...