CHAPEL HILL, N.C. (WNCN) – Will Bill Belichick take the University of North Carolina football team to new heights in his debut season as head coach?
That’s the multi-million-dollar question sitting in the minds of Tar Heels fans and college football enthusiasts across the country.
Amid the rising expectations, Belichick held a news conference on Wednesday to preview the Tar Heels’ season opener against TCU on Labor Day.
Belichick officially named South Alabama transfer Gio Lopez as the starting quarterback for the Tar Heels, saying he’s made a ton of progress through training camp and will be given as much preparation as possible before Monday night.
“I feel very comfortable with him and what he’s doing,” Belichick said Wednesday. “But he’ll get better as we go forward because we just will — we have a lot of practices in front of us, and a lot of games in front of us, and we’ll all learn a lot from those.
“I think he’s ready. But I think he’ll be like everybody: more ready as we go forward.”
The 6-foot redshirt sophomore threw for 2,559 yards and 18 touchdowns while also racking up 463 yards and seven scores on the ground last season at South Alabama. He committed to the Tar Heels this past spring and joined formal team workouts during preseason camp.
“All I can prove is if we put a W in the column, then I’m fine with that,” Lopez said earlier this month. “That’s all that matters to me.”
UNC is going all-in with its investment in the football program with the hopes of building a consistent winner in Chapel Hill, which became evident with Belichick’s hiring last December. The university signed the 73-year-old Belichick to a five-year deal — with the first three years guaranteed at $10 million in base and supplemental salary.
But the increased financial backing means higher pressure for a team to produce a winning product on the gridiron, with the spotlight fixated on the Tar Heels due to Belichick’s mere presence on the sideline.
“For all of us, it’s control what we can control,” Belichick said as UNC opened preseason camp earlier this month. “Whoever’s here or isn’t here, that’s out of our control. We have a job to do. We have a lot of work to accomplish.”
The arrival of the six-time Super Bowl-winning head coach marked a new era filled with pomp and circumstance, bringing its fair share of spectacle along with it.
“He’s coached at the highest level,” UNC receiver Jordan Shipp said earlier this month. “He’s coached the greatest players of all time. So it’s just like, you want to do what he’s telling you to do… It’s worked for so many people, so why wouldn’t it work for me?”
The Tar Heels underwent a massive overhaul after the school parted ways with former coach Mack Brown last year, including an entirely new coaching staff and 70 players who will suit up in Carolina blue for the very first time next week.
Excitement is already filling the air as football fever begins to grip the campus community. All season and single-game tickets for home games at Kenan Memorial Stadium sold out back in late July – the earliest this feat has ever happened in program history.
UNC is coming off a 6-7 record last year and was projected to finish eighth in the Atlantic Coast Conference preseason poll. So will all this enthusiasm live up to the hype? Only time will tell.
“At the end of the day, we’ve got to go out there and play football,” said UNC defensive back Thaddeus Dixon, a transfer who played under new defensive coordinator Steve Belichick at Washington. “He can’t make no plays.”
The Belichick era officially kicks off at Kenan Stadium when the TCU Horned Frogs roll into town on Monday. Kickoff is set for 8 p.m.
— The Associated Press contributed to this report