With the heartbreaking — from a UNC perspective — end to the College World Series almost two weeks ago, the 2025-2026 college sports year is also in the books. While it won’t be long until school starts up again and the fall sports get going, we are now into the full offseason when it comes to college sports.
On the whole, it was a pretty good one for North Carolina, with the athletics’ program finishing fourth in the annual Learfield Directors’ Cup competition. As always, there were some teams we wish would’ve done better, some teams that did better that we expected, and some that ended up winning some hardware. With the finality of the college sports year, it can be a time to look back. With the sporting year in the books, I want to know: what North Carolina Tar Heels’ sports team did you most enjoy watching last season?
Debates can be had as to what UNC team had the best season in 2025-26, but no matter the answer, the baseball team is definitely on the shortlist. They made it within a game of brining home the school’s first-ever College World Series championship, losing a decisive Game 3 to Oklahoma. For their success and just the way they played, they’re also my answer for today’s question.
A perfect example of the way this year’s baseball team played can be found in Game 3 of the Super Regional series that got them to Omaha. Having trailed much of the game, UNC were down 3-1 going to the bottom of the eighth inning. They got one run back there, but still trailed going to the bottom of the ninth. There, thanks to some help from USC, Carolina evened the score on a Jake Schaffner sacrifice fly. Then Owen Hull hit a deep fly ball that somehow evaded the Trojans’ center fielder’s glove, allowing the winning run to score, and sending UNC back to the College World Series.
The end in Omaha wasn’t the storybook one we all would’ve wanted, but unfortunately baseball can be a weird game in small samples, and that Oklahoma team was just on fire.
The baseball team is my answer, but what about you? What was your favorite UNC team during this past sporting year?
