Something completely new happened at the Dean E. Smith Center on Tuesday afternoon.
Oh, yes—Hubert Davis coached his first fall practice as the head coach of the Tar Heels. We'll get to that.
But the debut in question was Toby Keith blaring on the arena loudspeakers as practice began. Davis has instituted a rule that each player gets an opportunity to pick the pre-practice music. The selections go in order of age, oldest first.
That means Brady Manek drew the first draft choice, and it meant that his teammates—some for the first time in their lives—listened to an all-country music playlist as they prepared to begin the 2021-22 season.