North Carolina’s Five Most Important Players For 2014-15

1. Marcus Paige

Could the choice for the Tar Heels’ most indispensable player be more obvious?

Where to begin with the player who was the bedrock for North Carolina’s 24-win season a year ago and who will be the team’s most invaluable ingredient to success this year.

After a solid rookie campaign that saw the UNC point guard average just over eight points a game, Paige emerged as the Tar Heels’ go-to guy almost to a fault a season ago. Paige leaped to near the top of the ACC’s scoring and assists categories, ranking fourth with a 17.5 points-per-game average and sixth with his 4.2 dishes an outing.

He was without dispute North Carolina’s only consistent 3-point shooting threat, connecting on a league-leading 38.9 percent of his long-range tries. Paige also proved to be the Tar Heels’ lone player they could count on at the stripe, topping the ACC with an 87.7 percent average from the free-throw line on a team that ranked last in the conference from the line (62.5 percent).

Paige even ratcheted up his defensive play averaging 1.5 steals a game to rank seventh in the league, and after bottling up the all-everything performance last season it’s little wonder why he was recently tabbed as the ACC’s preseason player of the year, has been named to a host of preseason All-American squads and was rated by ESPN as college basketball’s second best player trailing only Wisconsin’s Frank Kaminsky.

North Carolina certainly will look for ramped-up production from the likes of Johnson and Meeks, and will hope to have an added perimeter weapon in Jackson. But there is little doubt who the straw is that will stir the drink, and who the Tar Heels will again lean on to fuel a hopeful Final Four run.