Right after the final whistle on Friday, with UNC basketball suffering a heartbreaking loss to Ole Miss in the first round of the NCAA Tournament, the cameras quickly went to senior guard RJ Davis. Davis has been a joy to watch for the Tar Heels, but this has now officially become his final game with North Carolina.
It's hard to put into words what he has meant to the program. Davis returning for a fifth year surprised a lot of people, as the assumption was that he'd say goodbye to Chapel Hill and go pro after last campaign. He didn't do that, working his tail off to get this team back into the tournament.
As you might have been able to guess, Davis was overcome with emotion talking about what his time with the program has meant to him. As Seth Trimble wiped away tears from his face, Davis didn't hesitate in saying the time he spent donning a North Carolina jersey was the best period of his life:
RJ Davis on his UNC career:
— Matt Fortuna (@Matt_Fortuna) March 21, 2025
“The past five years have been the best five years or my life. It’s bigger than basketball.” pic.twitter.com/wZWzVQoNSB
RJ Davis was overcome with emotion after playing his last North Carolina game
At halftime of Friday's game, North Carolina was down 44-26 to Ole Miss. It was pretty dang surprising, but this team never stopped fighting. Late in the action, North Carolina was in a position to potentially pull off a remarkable comeback, but it just wasn't meant to be for this team.
Davis scored a team-high 15 points for the Tar Heels in this one, but he struggled a bit to find his rhythm shooting the ball. He finished 6-of-17 on his field-goal attempts, including 1-for-8 on his 3-point tries.
Despite his poor shooting performance, it doesn't take a single thing away from what he has been able to get done playing for this team over the past five seasons. Davis was a locker room leader and a floor general for UNC.
The hope was that this group would be able to send him off with a deep run in the tournament, but the Rebels had other ideas. It's going to take plenty of time to get used to not seeing Davis wearing Tar Heel blue anymore. With that said, he'll always be known as being a UNC great. No one will be able to take that away from him.