UNC Chancellor Lee Roberts deflects questions about basketball coaching search

At Thursday morning’s meeting of the UNC Board of Trustees, the majority of questions posed to Chancellor Lee Roberts by members of the media focused on the ongoing UNC men’s basketball coaching search.

Roberts initially met with athletic director Bubba Cunningham and incoming AD Steve Newmark on Sunday to discuss the future of the program. Tuesday, Cunningham and Newmark met with Roberts again and made the recommendation for a leadership change. He accepted the recommendation, and Tuesday night around 9 p.m. word spread that Hubert Davis would not be returning for a sixth season as UNC’s head coach.

Thursday morning, Roberts declined to go into specifics on the characteristics UNC is looking for in a new coach, the search process, or potential timeline for the hire.

“I don’t have much to add to what I said (Wednesday),” Roberts said. “Hubert and Leslie Davis are phenomenal people. Coach Davis will tell you that he met his wife here at Carolina, became a Christian here, his uncle’s jersey is hanging in the rafters. Hubert and Leslie are Carolina parents. They love the university deeply, and the university loves them back. They’ll always have a place of pride in the hearts of the Carolina family.”

Roberts and Board of Trustees Chair Malcolm Turner emphasized that Cunningham and Newmark are running the coaching search process. UNC has also hired executive search firm Turnkey ZRG to assist, with consultant Chad Chatlos assisting. The school has also said it will also rely on an advisory group of former players, coaches and key stakeholders.

Cunningham was present at the Board of Trustees session Thursday morning at the Rizzo Center in Chapel Hill. For the second straight day, he stayed in the room as the board went into closed session. He and Newmark were present for Wednesday’s session, and both took part in a closed session on that day.

“We have a fine team leading that search, with Bubba Cunningham and Steve Newmark,” Turner said Thursday morning, “We need our leaders to lead, and I trust that they will do so and lead a great process with a great outcome. The board’s role is approval. So we await the output of that work and look forward to that process unfolding.”

Multiple UNC trustees came under fire for reportedly meddling in the hiring of Bill Belichick in 2024. UNC System President Peter Hans stripped the UNC-Chapel Hill Board of Trustees of a number of its responsibilities over the university’s athletic programs in early 2025 — a move intended to rein in “independent and unilateral actions” from some trustees that overstep the board’s official and designated authority.

When asked Thursday morning if he had any concerns regarding these changes, Turner said he had “none whatsoever.”

Davis’ firing on Tuesday night is the latest saga in what’s been a tumultuous few years for the UNC Athletics program — including the beginning of the revenue-share era, Belichick’s hiring and subsequent 4-8 first season, the Smith Center debate and changes to athletics leadership.

Roberts said Thursday morning he doesn’t see the basketball arena decision and UNC’s current coaching search as “necessarily linked.”

“The arena decision is a long term decision,” Roberts said. “It’s a 50-plus year decision. Obviously, any coaching decision is a much shorter-term decision, even though you hope that whoever you hire has a long and successful run…we’ve never put out a timeline on the arena decision. We’re continuing to seek as much feedback as we can, get as many voices around the table as we can.”

Roberts also emphasized he’s more than fine with all the attention on the university’s athletics department.

“Athletics is the most visible thing that we do,” he said. “I always come back to Coach (Dean) Smith’s formulation about athletics being the front porch of the university. So it’s not the house. Our mission of service, teaching and research to the state and its people is obviously the most important thing that we do, but athletics is the most visible. It’s been that way for a long time. I don’t see that changing anytime soon, and we couldn’t be more proud of our athletics program… we compete at a very high level across the board, and we’re going to try to keep it that way.”

This story was originally published March 26, 2026 at 12:18 PM.