One of the most talked-about and contentious issues happening on UNC’s campus right now is not about academics or budget cuts. It’s about where the Carolina men’s basketball team will call home in the years to come.
At the Coalition for Carolina, we haven’t weighed in. But the debate has dragged on long enough, and we believe it’s time to come to a productive resolution based on honesty, transparency and open communication.
This will require the input and cooperation of two groups: the UNC Administration – largely viewed as being proponents of moving the basketball venue to a brand new, state-of-the-art facility at Carolina North – and advocates who want to “Renovate, Don’t Relocate” the current Smith Center to preserve the 40-year legacy of the venue that is located on South Campus.
We want to commend both groups for their commitment to the University. We all want what’s best for Carolina, and sometimes there will be differences of opinion on what that means. As members of the Carolina family, it’s time to get past the bickering and the name calling and come together for the good of the University and the basketball program.
The pro-renovate Committee deserves credit and appreciation for pumping the brakes on the process of moving the arena to Carolina North without the proper analysis of all options.
In turn, we want to commend Chancellor Roberts and the UNC Administration for hearing those concerns, pausing and now setting up a new independent committee to make sure all options are properly vetted before arriving at a final decision.
In case you haven’t been following closely, we want to give you some background on the debate so you can understand how we got to this point in the decision-making process.
How Did We Get Here?
The Dean E. Smith Center – many times referred to as the “Dean Dome” – has been the home of Tar Heel basketball for the past 40 years, first opening on January 18, 1986. It was named for the legendary Dean Smith, who was the coach of the men’s basketball team at the time of construction and coached his final 12 seasons at the venue.
The 21,750-seat Smith Center allowed for much higher capacity than the previous men’s basketball venue of Carmichael Arena, which had a capacity of 8,800. Of course, the new construction at the time also allowed for other innovations and upgrades, which leads us to the current-day debate.
There is no question about it: there must be some sort of change to the current venue. In the least, the Smith Center needs a new roof. But other innovations and upgrades would allow for better student seating, premium suites found at many other high-end venues and all the bells and whistles you would expect from the home of a program as elite as Carolina’s.
Advocates of the “Renovate, Don’t Relocate” campaign – spearheaded by a group called the Committee for a South Campus Arena – want a commitment that the current Smith Center site will remain the home of men’s basketball. They argue that all the necessary upgrades can be made to the current venue at a reasonable cost, and that doing so will preserve the 40-year legacy of the program and honor the memory and wishes of Dean Smith by keeping the venue central to campus where students can easily get to and from games. High-profile backers of the “Renovate, Don’t Relocate” stance include former Coach Roy Williams and legendary player Tyler Hansbrough.
The UNC Administration has concerns about what they see as limitations and opportunities-cost in simply renovating, however. The Administration has spent considerable time and resources into planning how to best use the land at Carolina North. Last month, Chancellor Lee Roberts announced that a new Carolina North development will break ground in 2027, and while not committing to it as a decided matter, he said a new basketball venue could be developed on the site. Of course, with brand-new construction, the possibilities are endless – as long as there is a plan to pay for them.
To assess the possibilities, the Administration contracted a study on how a new, state-of-the-art basketball arena could be constructed on the site – something the “Renovate” backers want done for the Smith Center as well so that a direct cost comparison can be made.
Regardless of the strength and merits of the arguments on either side of the issue, there needs to be cooperation and open conversation. Deliberations on the future of the Smith Center began in 2024, but many influential stakeholders were kept in the dark about the process and first got wind of the now-imminent decision in late 2025, as reported by the News & Observer.
UNC Athletics Director Bubba Cunningham acknowledged that the University “dropped the ball” when providing clear, consistent communication on the matter. He told WRAL:
“We did a really good job of taking this expert opinion and building that. And then the next step of our process was to communicate all the things that we’ve learned and then get input from the basketball community, the students, everybody else that goes to our games, whether it’s our season-ticket holders, Rams Club members, everybody else. Quite frankly, I think that we dropped the ball. So from October of ’24 until just prior to Christmas ’25, we didn’t do that.”
We appreciate the University taking responsibility for not providing the transparency and open communication appropriate for a topic important to so many Tar Heel basketball fans.
Now it is time for all stakeholders to sit down, talk this through and do what’s right for Carolina. We will leave it to them to decide what that is. But coming to a fair, thoughtful resolution will require the cooperation and inclusion of advocates on both sides of the debate.