Fourth UNC Basketball Loss Equals Damaging Dip in NET Rankings

UNC basketball now sits among bubble teams and doesn't face another top-100 squad this week or next.

UNC basketball head coach Hubert Davis / Bob Donnan-Imagn Images

There's still plenty of season left for Hubert Davis' fourth UNC basketball team to prove worthy of a top-four seed in the NCAA Tournament. That said, a No. 1 seed may already be out of reach, as the Tar Heels suffered their third straight loss to drop to 4-4 overall via Wednesday night's 94-79 home defeat at the hands of Alabama and, given the ACC's struggles as a group, are running out of opportunities to make a splash on the national scene.

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UNC debuted at No. 26 in the season's first NCAA NET Rankings, a metric to evaluate teams for the Big Dance, released earlier this week.

With the loss to Alabama, the Tar Heels have since fallen to No. 41. They check in at No. 4 among ACC teams, but at this juncture, it's not all that farfetched to think the conference could put as few as three in the NCAA Tournament.

The ACC's top three representatives in the NET Rankings are Duke at No. 4, Pitt at No. 12, and Clemson at No. 15.

So, there's a significant gap between those and the rest of the conference, including UNC and only five others in the top 100.

UNC basketball next hosts Georgia Tech (No. 180 NET) at 2 p.m. ET Saturday (ACC Network) before welcoming La Salle (No. 136) to Chapel Hill the following Saturday. The Tar Heels then square off against Florida (No. 5), UCLA (No. 18), and Campbell (No. 271) to wrap up their December and non-conference slates.

Stay tuned to North Carolina Tar Heels On SI for more UNC basketball news.