How UNC basketball is benefitting from Caleb Wilson’s extensive film study

Florida State head coach Luke Loucks isn’t sure what freshman Caleb Wilson is earning at UNC, but he knows this much: “it’s not enough.”

“He’s about to make hundreds of millions of dollars if he keeps his head on straight and he continues to work,” Loucks said after Wilson recorded 22 points, 16 rebounds, six assists and two blocks in No. 12 UNC’s 79-66 win over FSU on Tuesday night.

The performance was Wilson’s sixth straight game with at least 20 points, making him the first UNC freshman to reach that mark. But Loucks didn’t need that historical context to commend Wilson’s performance against the Seminoles.

Loucks, the former Sacramento Kings assistant coach, simply emphasized his NBA background before adding this, “that is a bonafide, bonafide NBA player.”

And so perhaps it should come as no surprise that Wilson took a professional approach to his time off for the holidays. The freshman said that, when he was back home in Atlanta, he pulled up the film from all 13 of UNC’s nonconference games. He watched each one back on Synergy — an online platform that allows players and coaches to easily isolate individual possessions within a game and access video and data about certain types of plays.

“I kind of watched all my possessions and I sort of figured out what was going on,” Wilson said after North Carolina’s victory over FSU. “Like, I will only turn the ball over [if] it’s my fault. I’m not gonna let anybody speed me up.”

Wilson said he takes notes and charts plays as he goes. The freshman also takes time to watch the next team on the schedule.

“I look for a player that’s like — I don’t wanna say as good as me, but that’s gonna draw attention — that they’ve played before,” Wilson said, “and I see how they guard them and I know they’re gonna do the same thing against me, because coaches are stubborn.”

Studying FSU on film

Ahead of the Tar Heels’ matchup with FSU, Wilson pulled up film of the Seminoles’ game against Georgia earlier this month. The No. 23 Bulldogs’ roster includes Nigerian center Somto Cyril, who plays an “extremely aggressive” style in the post, per Wilson’s observations.

That provided a blueprint, Wilson said, for how Florida State might approach defending him on Tuesday night. He saw that every time Cyril caught the ball in the post, the Seminoles looked “scared” because “their guard who had to guard him is not strong.”

To help alleviate the one-on-one assignment, Wilson saw the Seminoles send an extra defender to the baseline or “dig” — meaning a brief lunge by a perimeter defender toward a posted-up offensive player. Digs are intended to bring some secondary ball pressure without double-teaming.

Again, that’s the intention.

“Once I saw that, I was like, they’re going to do the same thing against me — and they’re probably going to be even more scared against me,” Wilson said. “So all I gotta do is just face up. Or when I catch it, get it right back out.”

Wilson did just that — and more — on Tuesday night.

After North Carolina opened the game with a dismal 1-of-11 shooting performance, Wilson helped salve the disjointed first half offense by making the kind of plays that, in Hubert Davis’ words, “only he can make.”

Wilson scored around the rim at will, put a few Seminoles on posters, cleaned the glass and consistently found his open teammates — often in transition or dishing to Henri Veesaar (who finished with 12 second-half points) in the post.

Wilson led North Carolina in just about everything, becoming the first UNC freshman to lead the Tar Heels in points, rebounds and assists since Cole Anthony in 2020.

A reporter began to ask Veesaar about this after the game and he quickly pointed out, “I think he had blocks, too.” A quick glance at the stat sheet in front of the seven-footer confirmed this: Wilson’s two blocks were the fourth category the freshman led his team in on Tuesday night.

That adds another line to the record book: Wilson is the first Tar Heel to lead in points, rebounds, assists and blocks since Armando Bacot vs. Boston College in 2023.

But what won’t show up there, and what Veesaar wanted to highlight, is Wilson’s overall “effort and energy.”

“How much gravity he has on the floor — I think for most people, they don’t understand how much it helps us on the offense,” Veesaar said. “Like, he drives and he literally pulls five people in. And if he kicks it out, it creates long closeouts. We get an advantage off that, and that helps. Or even if he doesn’t have the ball, the defenders are always looking at where he’s at.”

Loucks agreed. After the game, the FSU coach detailed his team’s attempts to switch in the post and “front” — requiring help on the back side to minimize entry passes. They were largely futile.

“He’s absolutely relentless on the boards,” Loucks said. “He has size, length, athleticism. Kudos to Hubert and his staff for bringing a guy like Caleb in. That’s your prototypical UNC pro that’s gonna go make a ton of money playing basketball.”

Work ethic beyond his years

But Wilson’s work ethic, according to Davis, is anything but typical for a freshman.

The head coach smiled when asked about his star’s film study habits. The UNC staff instructs all the players to watch film on their own but Wilson, he said, takes it to “another level.”

This is nothing new for the freshman. Before the season began, in his introductory press conference, Wilson said he often watches film of defenders. Marcus Smart and Tony Allen are Wilson’s favorite pro players to emulate on that side of the ball.

Through studying their play and watching interviews with those players, Wilson has picked up a few defensive tricks.

“When somebody’s dribbling the ball, you never want to swipe down,” Wilson said in October. “You want to swipe up so the ref can see that you didn’t hit an arm... it’s a lot of things, like small things, that I look at and determined through film that allow me to make smart decisions.”

Wilson’s diligence to his off-court preparation has only increased as the season has gone on.

“He watches a ton of film — he’s a student,” Davis said on Tuesday, later adding, “I’ve never seen a freshman do this on his own. He gets the tapes. He probably already has tape of [our next opponent] SMU, and probably has already watched games of them.”

“He’s just always in a position of listening and learning. And when you have that type of person that is that talented, that’s pretty good.”

This story was originally published December 31, 2025 at 10:24 AM.