This past offseason, the University of North Carolina made college football’s boldest and biggest hire. They handed the program over to one of the greatest minds in the sport: six-time Super Bowl winner Bill Belichick. This will be the 73-year-old’s first college football job in his career.
The veteran coach is just a few months older than the man he replaces, Mack Brown. Brown was a college football lifer who was most famous for leading the Texas Longhorns to the 2005 National Championship. During an appearance on SiriusXM College Sports Radio’s “Dusty and Danny In The Morning,” Brown shared his verdict on Belichick’s success odds at Chapel Hill.
Mack Brown Weighs In on Whether Bill Belichick Would Win at North Carolina
Former North Carolina head coach Mack Brown shares his honest take on Bill Belichick’s fit and potential success in Chapel Hill. Brown went 44-33 in his second stint at UNC from 2019 through 2024. While his departure at the end of the 2024 season was a bit tumultuous, he seems to be at peace now with the program that fired him.
Mack Brown opens up on leaving UNC and shares with @DustyDvoracek & @dannykanell why UNC has a chance to be successful quickly with Bill Belichick. pic.twitter.com/Mj9yE3poOk
— College Sports on SiriusXM (@SXMCollege) May 20, 2025
“As far as North Carolina, Bill Belichick, he’s arguably the best coach ever. They’ve committed money to it. They’ve helped him with academics. They’ve lowered those standards some, so there’s no reason they shouldn’t be successful.”
“They’ve changed the roster, I think they’ve signed maybe 60-something new transfers, so you’ve got a chance to succeed at the highest level, and I expect them to do that and I’m proud of them,” Brown said.
According to Brown, before hiring Belichick, the program was very light on NIL funds. They had more stringent academic standards for recruits that they had to follow. This made it difficult to recruit the same caliber of player amid the significant changes that college football underwent during his tenure.
“In our last couple of years there, we were trying to get parents with money, we were trying to get kids with over a 3.0 [GPA] because that’s who we could get. We signed 26 players at North Carolina our next to last year, and didn’t pay them a penny.”
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While Brown’s estimation of UNC’s roster turnover under their new coach is a bit inflated, the Tar Heels will indeed look very different this upcoming college football season. North Carolina added 40 players via the transfer portal, with 51 players departing the program during the offseason.
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