UNC Basketball: Five Tar Heels who outplayed their recruiting ranking

These five UNC basketball players outperformed their recruiting ranking

The North Carolina Tar Heels have had their fair share of elite athletes in the 109-year history of the program. From their 74 McDonald’s All-Americans, 20 Olympians, eight National Player of the Year award recipients and 100-plus NBA players, the Tar Heels have boasted some of the most talented players in the sport over the past century.

Some of the players came to Chapel Hill with big reputations, and high expectations to match. Others joined the Tar Heels as lesser known commodities, flying under the radar a bit throughout their high school career.

High school basketball isn’t a level playing field, either, which can make it tough for coaches and scouts to accurately assess a player’s talent and future potential. A big, physically gifted prospect who’s playing at a small school against lesser competition, for example, can appear more skilled and dominant than a player waiting his turn behind other elite recruits at a high-level preparatory school.

And sometimes college basketball programs and recruiting outlets simply don’t have enough boots on the ground to cover every single player that might play at the next level, though this is becoming less of an issue as this part of the sport continues to gain popularity.

There are a number of Tar Heels that have lived up to their expectations nicely, while others have underachieved in relation to their recruiting ranking coming out of high school. These five UNC basketball players, though, outperformed their respective rankings, and went on to have great careers at North Carolina.