UNC Basketball: Former Tar Heel looks sharp in first NBA game

Former UNC basketball standout Day’Ron Sharpe looked fantastic in the first NBA action of his young career.

Day’Ron Sharpe logged the first 14 minutes of his young NBA career in Sunday night’s preseason opener against the Los Angeles Lakers, and it went just about as well as anyone could have hoped.

The Greenville, North Carolina native and Monteverde Academy graduate came off the Nets’ bench to score 13 points on a 4-for-7 shooting performance and 5-for-7 at the free throw line. He also pulled down six rebounds and had two steals in Brooklyn’s 123-97 victory over the LeBron-less Lakers.

It was an impressive performance for the 19-year-old center that was selected 29th overall in the 2021 NBA Draft. That followed a one-year stint at the University of North Carolina in which he averaged 9.5 points, 7.6 rebounds and 1.4 assists in just 19.2 minutes per game off the bench. He shot nearly 52 percent for the season, and established himself as one of the nation’s best offensive rebounders during his time in Chapel Hill.

It was there that he first showed the kind of flashes that we saw from him on Sunday night at the Staples Center in front of more than 19,000 fans. He’ll need to keep up performances like this throughout the preseason and into the regular season in order to earn his playing time in Brooklyn. The team has a handful of past and current All-Stars — including a number of solid post players — making it a crowded locker room with a lack of available minutes on the court in the coming season.

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