I find it hard to believe any Heels fan would "slam" Nate, Dave. All he's done is be the ultimate team player, comport himself well on and off the court, and play any role he's been asked to play. I fully expect him to do all those things next year.
Will he play an expanded role, possibly starting? It's certainly possible. It's also possible that his minutes could drop slightly. Either way, I'm sure he'll handle it like a man and like the good teammate he is.
There's no doubt that his defense improved last year. TBS, he needs to work even harder on his defense, especially if he's going to be be spending any time at SG, as many believe. He's undersized for that spot and not particularly strong, so he needs to continue to get as strong as he can.
I think his primary role will be backing up Joel at PG so he needs to bring Senior poise to that role and run our offense efficiently. IOW, limit his mistakes, knock down the open three, and be a vocal leader. He's embraced every role Roy's given him and I expect nothing less next year.
Well, I said that about folks maybe being surprised that I was not slamming Nate simply because I have been hard on the kid at times and to some if you critique a player it is akin to slamming the player. I critique players all the time and granted some more than others but to me it is always about their play, not about the kid himself unless there are off court issues. Nate is a great kid, I don't always love his game and when I don't I try to fasirly point out what concerns me.
There are some things with nate he can't do a lot about, he is still going to be a little fella, don't see him becoming a ball handling whiz nor do I see him becoming a knock down jump shooter. But the kid plays within his role, he doesn't take bad shots often, he doesn't try to do things that are not within his skill set or physical ability and I like that. Nate really improved in the area that caused me so much heart burn last season by really working a heck of a lot harder and smarter on the defensive end. No, he isn't going to be on any all ACC defensive teams but he worked much harder to stay with his man last season and rather than being a defensive liability actually became a guy that helped us defensively. That was a HUGE change HUGE!
I want to see him work even harder this season in understanding what we are doing defensively and fight thru those screens, still at times drops under to deep. I want him to really work even harder on his ball handles, improved that last season as well but still a good ways to go in that aspect. He started to show off a floater that I really liked, he really isn't a guy that is going to be able to take it hard to the rack often to draw those fouls but the floater allows him to get close in and still finish over long defenders.
His shooting trailed off last season, maybe that was due to reduced PT and coming in colder off the bench but with the shots he takes, usually cleanish looks, need to drop those at least above 35% so needs to hones than in more.
Personally, Roy showed me last season, he prefers Nate at the 2 much more than at the point, Nate looks more like a PG but he plays more like a 2. Frankly, we may see nate backing up Joel a good bit early on but I strongly suspect that as we get in to the conference slate we will see more 7th backing up Joel and Nate playing more at the 2 spot, starting there unless Kenny or Brob show they can take over the position. Kenny and BRob offer more length at the 2 but still have to show they can shoot at this level and be relied on to drain pressure shots. Nate has the strong experience advantage so we will have to see how all that shakes out.
