{"id":596998,"date":"2026-02-11T16:22:13","date_gmt":"2026-02-11T16:22:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/596998\/"},"modified":"2026-02-11T16:22:13","modified_gmt":"2026-02-11T16:22:13","slug":"caleb-wilsons-off-night-and-hand-wrap-fuel-uncertainty","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/596998\/","title":{"rendered":"Caleb Wilson\u2019s Off Night and Hand Wrap Fuel Uncertainty"},"content":{"rendered":"

MIAMI, Fla. \u2014 It\u2019s simple: the Tar Heels go as Caleb Wilson<\/a> goes.\u00a0Tuesday night was not Caleb Wilson\u2019s night, and the Tar Heels followed suit, seeing their five-game winning streak come to a sobering end in a 75-66 loss to Miami.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In his first half since his iconic 23-point performance in his inaugural meeting with Duke, Wilson managed three points on three field-goal attempts in Tuesday\u2019s opening 20 minutes.<\/p>\n

Wilson\u2019s first two touches against the Hurricanes resulted in turnovers, an ominous sign of things to come as UNC\u2019s star freshman posted a team-worst minus-11 plus\/minus in the first half.<\/p>\n

On the night, Wilson finished with 12 points \u2014 his lowest output of the season \u2014 as well as a minus-15. He had several explosive plays, with three blocks and a big dunk down the middle of the lane, but there were far larger reasons for concern in the wake of Tuesday\u2019s loss. The consistent motor and overall emotional spark seemed to be missing on this night, and most importantly there\u2019s the matter of his left hand. <\/p>\n

As Wilson walked onto the court to start the second half, he could be seen looking briefly at his left hand. Several minutes later, at the 15:51 mark, Wilson approached Hubert Davis during a break in the action, gesturing toward his left hand.<\/p>\n

Wilson exited the game less than a minute later and went to the end of the Tar Heel bench to visit with UNC trainer Doug Halverson.<\/p>\n

After an initial examination by Halverson, the two left the bench and headed down the tunnel to the UNC locker room. Several minutes later, Wilson\u2019s mother, Sabrina, made the same trip.<\/p>\n

The star freshman returned to the bench and, following taping of his hand from Halverson, re-entered Tuesday\u2019s contest at the 8:47 mark.<\/p>\n

Despite converting his first shot upon re-entering \u2014 a right-handed hook at the 8:38 mark \u2014 UNC\u2019s freshman phenom never quite looked the same, finishing 2-for-5 from the field with his shot attempts being mostly one-handed. Wilson did get to the free-throw line, getting fouled on a putback dunk attempt and on a deep jumper, going 3-for-4 on those free throw attempts after his return to the action.<\/p>\n

The moment that best encapsulated Wilson\u2019s uncharacteristic night came at the 2:04 mark of the second half.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Down 64\u201360, Wilson seemed to either forget or simply make no effort to box out Miami\u2019s Ernest Udeh Jr. on Udeh Jr.\u2019s missed free throw, allowing the Hurricanes\u2019 big man to easily secure his own miss and push Miami\u2019s lead back to six.<\/p>\n

The Tar Heels\u2019 coach pulled Wilson from the game 20 seconds later and sat him for the final 1:43 of Tuesday\u2019s loss.<\/p>\n

Whether that substitution was injury or effort-related remains to be seen.\u00a0When asked if Wilson\u2019s apparent injury contributed to his off night, Davis was brief, responding, \u201cNot to my knowledge.\u201d<\/p>\n

What made Davis\u2019 comments peculiar, however, was that moments earlier the head coach curtly insisted there was \u201cno situation\u201d to monitor with the Tar Heels\u2019 rookie when asked about his left hand.<\/p>\n

None of Wilson\u2019s teammates addressed the uncertainty after the game either.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In Wilson\u2019s almost six-minute absence earlier in the half, the Tar Heels held their own, out-scoring the Hurricanes 7-4. But Miami outscored UNC 9-6 over the final 1:43 of the game after he exited.<\/p>\n

Make no mistake, Wilson\u2019s off night was one of a slew of reasons the Tar Heels fell short Tuesday. The state of the apparent hand injury, and whether UNC will be without their future lottery pick when Pittsburgh makes the trip to Chapel Hill on Saturday, will be the questions that needs to be answered in the days to come.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MIAMI, Fla. \u2014 It\u2019s simple: the Tar Heels go as Caleb Wilson goes.\u00a0Tuesday night was not Caleb Wilson\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":596999,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3724],"tags":[7,5391],"class_list":{"0":"post-596998","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-basketball","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-caleb-wilson-25-holy-innocents-episcopal-school"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116052921590814520","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/596998","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=596998"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/596998\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/596999"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=596998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=596998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=596998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}