Jeff zone 8 N.C.

Yes it can be overwintered here and will fruit. I always mulched all my bananas well because we are in N.C. and while we can have quite mild winters we always get at least one lower temp freeze (like this years) and probably more and there is the possibility of those rare killer freezes. You can always wrap the trunk too to get a head start on spring. There are many old banana clumps around that have survived for many decades that are not the cold hardy basjoo type.