Caleb Wilson doing what he can to help UNC basketball land a 5-star SF

After narrowly sneaking into the NCAA Tournament last season, Hubert Davis is under pressure to win now at North Carolina, but hot-seat talk didn’t square away the 2025 recruiting class. With a healthy NIL budget, Davis was able to land the No. 5 high school class in the country, a group of four newcomers headlined by five-star forward Caleb Wilson. 

Now, though he likely expects to be a one-and-done player heading for the NBA, Wilson is doing what he can to keep the talent pipeline flowing to Chapel Hill, pitching in for the recruitment of 2026 five-star forward Anthony Thompson. Thompson took his official visit to UNC over the weekend and shared pictures from the trip, including one with Wilson. 

That gave Wilson the green light to comment on Thompson’s recruitment on social media, as he appears to be instrumental in Davis’s recruiting efforts now that he’s arrived on campus. 

Could Wilson’s recruiting efforts hint at a multi-year college career? 

Rare are the players who are influential enough and so dedicated to the program that they are effective recruiters, but Wilson already appears to fit into that category before ever scoring a bucket or playing a game for the Tar Heels. While outwardly it’s just a social media post, if Wilson was also spending time with Thompson on campus and actively involved in his visit, that could be a sign that he’s planning to stay around Chapel Hill beyond his freshman season. 

Many one-and-done prospects have one eye on the NBA throughout their short-lived collegiate careers, but Wilson appears to be putting all of his energy towards the North Carolina program, and he may not do that for a recruit like Thompson if he doesn’t expect to play with him. 

Now that players are legally getting paid at the collegiate level, both through NIL and directly from the university through the revenue-sharing cap, more players who would’ve considered professional alternatives like the G-League or Overtime Elite, are flocking back to college, and more players who would’ve been questionable one-and-done prospects in the past, are staying around an additional season. Wilson may fall into the latter category, looking to further bolster his credentials with multiple seasons at North Carolina, while still cashing a nice paycheck to do so. 

It’s far from a certainty, and at this point is pure speculation, but Wilson will be a player to keep an eye on, not just throughout his highly anticipated freshman season, but when it comes time for him to make an NBA Draft decision in the spring.