In one of the most impressive and compelling moves in college football history, six-time Super Bowl-winning coach Bill Belichick was named North Carolina's new head coach on Wednesday night.
UNC officials said the sides have agreed to a five-year contract, pending approval from the Board of Trustees, which is scheduled to hold an emergency meeting Thursday.
Belichick, 72, served in the NFL in some capacity from 1975 until his divorce from the New England Patriots after the 2023 season. This will be his first college coaching job.
Belichick's father, Steve, was an assistant coach for the Tar Heels from 1953 to 1955.
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“I grew up around college football with my father and treasured those times,” Belichick said in a press release announcing the move. “I have always wanted to coach in college and now I am excited to build the soccer program at Chapel Hill.”
Belichick's hiring at North Carolina, which hasn't won an ACC football title since 1980, was driven by CEO John P. Preyer, who had been focused on Belichick in recent weeks. Sources told ESPN that the two sides met multiple times and in detail, including five hours on Sunday, and those discussions culminated in Belichick closing the deal on Wednesday.
For a program riddled with apathy and mediocrity, this represents a significant and compelling departure from Mack Brown, as Belichick gives the Tar Heels an unprecedented boost in star power for 2025 and beyond.
Tar Heels athletic director Bubba Cunningham said Belichick's hiring positions the program well in the changing landscape of college sports.
“Bill Belichick is a football legend and hiring him to lead our program represents a new approach that will ensure Carolina football can evolve, compete and win – today and in the future,” Cunningham said in the press release School. “At Carolina, we believe in providing our student-athletes with championship opportunities and the best possible experience, and Coach Belichick shares that commitment.”
Michael Lombardi, a former NFL executive who was also an assistant to Belichick with the Patriots from 2014 to 2016, said Wednesday night he will serve as general manager of the Tar Heels program.
The Patriots' six Super Bowls under Belichick are an NFL record. (He won two more as an assistant coach with the New York Giants.) He enters college football with 333 NFL wins, trailing only Don Shula's record of 347.
North Carolina fired the 73-year-old Brown on Nov. 26 after a 6-6 season and finished his second stint at the school with a 44-33 record over six years. He coached the Tar Heels' regular-season finale, a 35-30 loss to NC State, then said it was “a great time for me to get out.”
The hiring of the notoriously aloof Belichick, who joked about his press conference aura on “The Pat McAfee Show” on Monday, represents a marked departure from Brown's syrupy Southern charm.
Belichick has spent his year away from the sidelines doing multiple media jobs while making it clear he wanted to return to coaching. After exploring several NFL positions last year following his departure from New England, Belichick was expected to explore the NFL market again.
However, sources told ESPN that a return to coaching in general was paramount for Belichick. He spent a lot of time with his former assistant, Washington Huskies coach Jedd Fisch, and talked college football with friends and former assistant coaches. Belichick's son Stephen is the Huskies' defensive coordinator and is expected to be involved in some capacity on North Carolina's staff.
Oldest in FBS
At 72, Bill Belichick is now the oldest head coach in the FBS. The oldest newcomer so far this season was Mack Brown (73), whom Belichick will succeed in North Carolina:
| trainer | Old | School |
|---|---|---|
| Bill Belichick* | 72 | North Carolina |
| Kirk Ferentz | 69 | Iowa |
| KC Keeler* | 65 | temple |
| Kyle Whittingham | 65 | Utah |
| * Takeover in 2025 | ||
| – ESPN stats and information | ||
Through the annual NFL Draft, Belichick has built up a reserve of college coach confidants and has shown up to college games this year at places like Washington, Rutgers and LSU.
Belichick also spent the last few days familiarizing himself with the transfer portal and NIL, and he spent a lot of time on how a college system's organizational chart would work.
In his interview with McAfee on Monday, he made it clear that as a college coach he would create an incubator for NFL talent.
“If I were to go to a college program, the college program would be a connection to the NFL for the players that would have the opportunity to play in the NFL,” Belichick said. “It would be a professional program: training, nutrition, programming, coaching and techniques that would translate to the NFL.”
He concluded a lengthy portrait of what the program would look like by saying, “It would be an NFL program, but not at the NFL level.”
If talks between Belichick and North Carolina had failed, Cleveland Browns passing specialist and tight ends coach Tommy Rees was considered the favorite for the Tar Heels job, league sources told ESPN. Rees applied for the job twice and had Nick Saban as his attorney.
Other names that emerged in the search included veteran NFL coach Steve Wilks, Tulane coach Jon Sumrall, Georgia defensive coordinator Glenn Schumann, Army coach Jeff Monken and Pittsburgh Steelers offensive coordinator Arthur Smith.
Smith indicated he would stay with the Steelers, and Tulane agreed in principle to a contract extension with Sumrall.
