Who is Byron Sanders?

The UNC basketball team faces an interesting predicament going into the 2005-2006 season, in that they lose their top seven scores from the national championship team last year. The incoming freshman class is a solid one, but no one is quite sure what to expect.

One player no one is expecting anything from is Byron Sanders. And why should we? Byron played significant minutes his freshman year, being thrust into a starting role once Sean May went down with the foot injury. He wasn't too impressive then, and he hasn't shown anything since...

But there is reason to believe that we may something different from Sanders this year. With a health may playing in front of him for his Sophomore and Junior years, we saw very little of Byron, as he played only 4.7 and 3.0 minutes per game, usually in garbage time. It is said that players improve the most between their freshman and sophomore years. But we never got a chance to see that from Byron. Just because he didn't improve to the point where he would steal minutes from Sean May, doesn't mean he wasn't improving.

The fact is, we have no idea what Byron Sanders is capable of. He may have not changed at all. Or, maybe he has. We shall have to wait and find out. But the fact is that we have yet to see any of the players on this team play any significant minutes, and that just leaves a lot of question marks for the upcoming season. It should be interesting to watch players like David Noel, Byron Sanders, and Reyshawn Terry move from backups and bench warmers to starters, and hopefully to watch leaders emerge.

The Tar Heels are not going to be favorites to win anything this year...but it should still be a fun year to watch...

To quote Roy Williams, when asked what fans will find exciting about this team:
"Wow, I think it will hit them right between the eyes, 'Man, we don’t know any of these guys.' When you lose your top seven players… We’ve never lost our top three scorers in one year. So I think the major thing is how new everybody is. They’ll know David [Noel] and they’ll know Reyshawn [Terry]… But I don’t think they’ll know anything about anybody."