Charlotte Hornets: Reasons to be excited in a rebuilding year

3. North Carolina is a college basketball hotbed

Imagine if the Charlotte Hornets were this bad last year. There is no better college basketball state in the nation than North Carolina, and UNC and Duke are surely going to produce the kind of talent that will be right up near the top of the lottery for the Hornets, wherever they may land in the draft order, to pick.

So go nuts on sports talk radio, denizens of Charlotte! You, more than any other NBA fanbase, can easily shift focus to college ball while using it as the impetus for hope for the future of your pro squad.

Ask any other fan base what a quality salve it is during lean times when the Next Big Thing is one lucky ping pong ball bounce away from saving your franchise from eternal gloom.

Speaking of guys who came out of college and can help an NBA team, you guys did just draft a couple of them…