CHAPEL HILL – Since there’s a strong likelihood Cole Anthony will spend just one year in college, why not get everything he can out of it?

For example, why not play in a palace that is a basketball shrine with ghosts of the program’s lore hovering above connecting new history to its fabled past? And why not go ahead and add to it?

Not every one-and-done prospect is composed the same way. Some want to jet off to the big-money life of the NBA leaving precious little impact in their wake. Anthony, however, carries a different disposition into his freshman season at North Carolina.

He understands basketball and its many nuances from prep, collegiate and professional perspectives. He knows the game. He was raised in it, and from what happens on the court, the adulation that comes with success and the eventual business aspects, Anthony is well fortified for this endeavor even though he hasn’t yet played a game in college.

That will change next week when UNC opens its season at home against Notre Dame and the point guard is formally handed the keys to something so big that he recognizes his presence is merely one in a long line of many.

“The opportunity to play at North Carolina,” Anthony quickly replied, when asked what excites him the most about playing at UNC. “That alone is something not a lot of people have ever said they had the opportunity to do. I’m happy to be here.”

Happy to be there and ready to win basketball games doing whatever it takes.

Anthony, who is 6-foot-3 and has few, if any, holes in his game, is a projected lottery pick in next summer’s NBA draft, so it’s likely he will run the show in the Dean Dome for just one season. But his hoops DNA mandates he scratch and claw his way to as many wins as possible for the Tar Heels with the goal of cutting down the nets in April clearly among his priorities. Winning is now and now is his moment.

“I’m not looking past it,” Anthony said. “I’ve got a bunch of good people around me, my teammates, my brothers. I’m just making the most of it.”

For UNC to make the most of Anthony’s time in Chapel Hill, he must perform very close to the level many observers anticipate. He’s considered the top freshman in the nation by multiple media outlets, including CBS Sports, and the ACC media voted him the preseason Freshman of the Year and to the preseason first-team All-ACC club.

And, he’s a point guard. Carolina’s history of great point guards goes back to the 1950s and includes perhaps the program’s most beloved player, Phil Ford, who starred for Dean Smith in the 1970s. Even just during Roy Williams’ tenure Raymond Felton, Ty Lawson, Kendall Marshall, Marcus Paige, Joel Berry and Coby White have had the keys. So, Anthony now has the torch and knows it's an awesome responsibility.

"Coach Williams has the most Cousy Award winners here, so that's awesome to come into this program that has a great lineage of point guards…,” Anthony said. “There are a lot of expectations to live up to, but I'm ready."

Maintaining that standard is really what this is all about. If he does, so many things will fall into place for Anthony personally and with respect to the Tar Heels.

Pressure?

“I hope I don’t mess it up,” he said, smiling.

It’s that grin and clear confidence meshed with unique skills and natural gifts that has Tar Heels fans so excited. He just might be one of those rare freshmen that can handle this load, as daunting as it is. Anthony clearly has the game.

“He’s a different point guard,” Williams said, comparing him to last year's freshmen point guard, who's now in the NBA. “Coby was more of a scoring point guard, which I’m okay with, I like point guards that can score and I thought Coby did that great. Cole can score, but Cole is more of a quarterback back there trying to get other people the ball...

“Cole is good defensively, and I’ve said this to him and said it publicly, in high school he was the best defensive rebounding guard I’ve ever seen and we’re going to need him to go rebound the defensive boards for us, too.”

Great defensive rebounding guards have big motors. They can be fearless and driven to win every possession, and with basically every other response from Anthony in a recent interview focused on him saying he'll do whatever is asked to get wins, it’s definitely in his blood. Defense, rebounding, passing, even coming off the bench, he says he’ll embrace Williams’ command.

Anthony wants to win, and that’s the other thing he stresses. And winning is a way of life for him and not just on the hardwood.

His family’s success is rather impressive. His father, Greg Anthony, was the point guard for UNLV’s great teams that won the national championship in 1990 and lost just once, in the national semifinals, in 1991 before playing a decade in the NBA and serving as a basketball analyst on TV.

Anthony’s mother, Crystal McCrary-McGuire, is an author, filmmaker and respected attorney with vast experiences in her esteemed career and is married to Raymond McGuire, the former Global Head of Corporate and Investment Banking for Citicorp.

Playing at North Carolina is playing to a standard, every day, every game, every season and for each individual career.

Anthony’s time in Chapel Hill may last just one year, but he’s there to make an impression that will carry on with so many others woven into the fabric that makes Carolina what it’s been for more than a half century.

“They've called North Carolina the ‘Hoop State’ before, right,” Anthony rhetorically asked. “That's what it is.”

And his role on these hallowed grounds is best summed up in the 19-year-old’s simple words.

“Whatever they need me to do,” he said, “I'm here to do."

That, more than anything, is Anthony getting the most out of his experience, as it will benefit him, his team and satisfy the standard he’s chosen to embrace.