The 2025 offense was putrid. Some blame Gio Lopez, some blame Freddie Kitchens, some blame Mike Lombardi, and some blame Bill Belichick. All of them contributed in their own way. A unit that ranked as one of the worst in UNC history required a lot of contributions at all levels.
Freddie got fired, but the rest remain. The hunt for a new offensive coordinator will tell fans a lot about the direction Belichick and Lombardi wish to go with the offense. Timing, relative to the looming portal season, runs
short; prospective transfers likely want a clear vision of what the offense will look like and what their role in it will be. Speculation currently centers on four names, each representing a different solution to the same problem. Feel fee to add your thoughts on these, or others you’d like to see directing the UNC offense, below in the comments.
Mega Buzz: Chip Kelly
Belichick and Kelly are reported to be good friends. Chip runs an offense emphasizing the run game, which Belichick prefers. The two have a high comfort level with each other’s view of what constitutes smart football. And by stroke of good fortune, Chip’s looking for a job as the Las Vegas Raiders once again watch a failed coaching experiment, this time Pete Carroll, stumble towards the finish line.
Kelly made a name for himself as an offensive wizard coaching New Hampshire, producing over 400 yards a game in seven of his eight seasons there. Oregon snapped him up as offensive coordinator, and his attack immediately turned the P12 on its head. Chip’s offense moved Oregon from “just another P12 team we only notice when they occasionally upset USC or Washington” to the national radar. Within two years, he elevated to the head coaching position. Over the next four years, Kelly’s teams produced a 46-7 record with a national title game appearance and two Rose Bowls.
Kelly ran afoul of the NCAA, with some personal checks written to a Texas player broker, and he was off to the NFL. Three years with the Eagles ended with a dismissal. A 2-14 disaster with the 49ers in 2016 sealed his fate as a NFL head coach forevermore. Kelly took a year off before landing in the UCLA head coaching position, where he stayed six years.
Running a college program seemed to frustrate him, and he left UCLA voluntarily to run the offense at Ohio State for Ryan Day. That offense, oozing with NFL talent, lead the nation in efficiency metrics and stormed through last year’s playoffs to a national title. Kelly parlayed that success into a huge NFL payday, accepting a $6 million offer to follow Pete Carroll to the Raiders. The Raiders, 2-12, started firing coaches midseason, Kelly among them. The Raiders offense currently ranks last in the NFL in yards and points per game.
Kelly’s knowledge of offensive football runs deep, and he brings a variety of NFL and college experience to the table. His offensive ideas, revolutionary during his time at Oregon, have become very familiar to both the college and NFL games. Kelly seems to have modified his approach, as his offense under Ryan Day at OSU emphasized some simple concepts to leverage the talent advantages the Buckeyes had in almost every game they played.
YouTube has some great video breakdowns of what Kelly ran at OSU, but the talent advantages there won’t be present here, making much of that analysis specific to OSU 2024. Similarly, the Raiders offense this year doesn’t seem very predictive of what we could see here from a Kelly offense. Kelly at OSU did a wonderful job of keeping things simple and letting players make plays. The Raiders offense, on the other hand, just doesn’t work, in part because the QB play has been horrendous. Still, the pieces there didn’t mesh, and that includes the union of Carroll and Kelly. Carroll early in the season cited play calling as a frustration in post-game press conferences. Beat reporters for the Raiders questioned the offense’s predictability, especially in the passing game.
Kelly to UNC would add another high profile coaching name to the staff. Kelly’s national title with Ohio State and wizardry at Oregon would make an attractive sales pitch to high school recruits and coveted transfers. Kelly’s long-standing relationship with Belichick would make the transition seamless. Ideally, Kelly’s reputation and ego would allow him to stand firm in a room with Mike Lombardi and Bill Belichick. Those would be significant pluses moving into 2026.
Lot of Smoke: Bobby Petrino
Supporters of this path call Petrino a “genius” and a “home run hire.“ UNC fans heard those labels frequently last December, so skepticism abounds. Our last round of ”can’t miss” hiring yielded a 4-8 record and a clown show off the field. That second part impacts the possibility of a Petrino hire. The man has a reputation for offenses that produce big numbers on the stat sheet and scoreboard. He also has a reputation for some other things.
We’ll get to the numbers in a second. The idea of Bobby Petrino walking the sidelines at UNC brings baggage. Most fans remember his motorcycle accident while coach at Arkansas. That incident brought to light an inappropriate relationship with a university employee. That employee happened to be the wife of one of Petrino’s graduate assistants. The University of Arkansas also cited abuse of university funds when it fired Petrino for cause.
Petrino has more disturbing history in his professional life as well. He walked out on his job as coach of the Atlanta Falcons in the middle of a season. Just left one night. He left a letter in the locker room for his players announcing his departure. Prior to that, Petrino and Auburn were caught meeting in person to discuss Auburn’s coaching position while Auburn still had a coach and Petrino was still employed by Louisville.
Add it all up, and Petrino earned a reputation of a man absent a moral compass who cares only about himself. His presence in a program attempting to build a new culture seems problematic to some. On the other hand, Petrino has spent the last three seasons working at SEC schools (Texas AM 2023, Arkansas 2024-2025) for a reason: his offenses score a lot of points. That makes him attractive to the “don’t care, just win” contingent present in every fan base.
On that front, digging into the numbers beyond points and yards per game, some questions emerge. Texas A&M and Arkansas, with Petrino on the sidelines, produced a collective record of 16-22. Arkansas’ defense this year currently ranks 99th (one spot above UNC). However, Texas AM in 2023 and Arkansas last season fielded defenses ranked 23rd and 47th, respectively (UNC hasn’t put a defense on the field matching 47th in a decade, 23rd in almost two decades). A great offense paired with good defenses should produce more wins?
How might Petrino’s offense have contributed to those records? Start with turnovers. His offenses turned the ball over 58 times over those three seasons — 15 at Texas AM and 43 at Arkansas. Add drives that put the defense immediately back onto the field. “Busted drives” are drives that gain no yards or even lose yards. Petrino’s offenses the last three years rank 70th, 90th, and 85th in that category.
Between turnovers and drives that go nowhere or backwards, Petrino’s offense tends to be boom or bust. The booms are noteworthy, but the strategic risk-reward calculations driving Petrino’s offensive approach run counter to Bill Belichick’s clear preference for ball control and protecting his defense. That would make the two of them very much an odd couple from an Xs and Os standpoint. The pairing would offer the tantalizing possibility of a strategic merger, potent offense paired with stout defense. The real possibility of strategic conflict also exists, however.
Also a ton of buzz: Andy Kotelnicki
Kotelnicki directed the offense for Penn State this season and last. That offense ultimately led to the dismissal of James Franklin, an extremely cautious unit that blew out overmatched opponents but played “not to lose” against high-end competition until deficits forced the play calling to get more aggressive. That aggression usually resulted in game-ending turnovers. That portion of Kotelnicki’s resume probably won’t excite fans much.
Kotelnicki’s work prior to Penn State, though, demonstrates how he could end up running the offense for one of the richest programs in the sport. His work at Buffalo produced the nation’s 26th ranked offense in 2018 and 6th in 2020. He then went to Kansas, where his offenses ranked 13th nationally in 2022 and 8th in 2023. His offenses in those two locations operated with more creativity and aggression than Penn State, so one wonders how much restriction Franklin imposed on play design and play calling.
Those concerns translate to Belichick’s operation here. Belichick and Lombardi fired Kitchens, but the fact remains Lombardi was responsible for the offensive ingredients, and Belichick was responsible for limiting the menu to his favorite recipes. Would Kotelnicki be given the autonomy to operate the offense in ways he feels most productive? Would Kotelnicki be able in staff meetings to assert his best judgment if it runs counter to the wishes of Belichick and Lombardi?
In other words, would Belichick hire Kotelnicki to run offense the way Kotelnicki sees fit? That likely produces the type of offense Kotelnicki operated at Kansas. Or, would the hire be more an effort to find someone willing to maximize offensive production within constraints imposed by Belichick? In that case, the offense probably resembles Penn State’s the last two seasons, minus the future NFL talent across the roster.
In the mix: Tommy Rees
Rees currently runs the offense for the Cleveland Browns. Last year he worked for the Browns as tight ends coach. In 2023, he ran Nick Saban’s offense at Alabama. Prior to that, he worked under Brian Kelly at Notre Dame. That checks a lot of boxes reportedly on the candidate evaluation sheet: NFL experience, college experience, play calling, recruiting.
As the Cleveland Browns spiral towards a three or four win season, speculation mounts that the coaching staff there will be dismissed in its entirety. When evaluating Rees’s time with the Browns, remember the front office disaster that sunk much salary cap into the inactive and ineffective Deshaun Watson. That trade and contract are frequently cited as candidates for the worst in NFL history. Rees at Alabama and Notre Dame connects to successful college offenses while working under two of the college game’s biggest names.
In the mix: Kevin Decker
Decker has run the offense at Old Dominion since 2023 and at Fordham the three seasons prior to that. His offense resembles Josh Heupel’s at Tennessee by all accounts: very college, very not NFL. FEI (which adjusts for opponent strength) rates his three offenses at Old Dominion 105th, 72nd, and then 68th this season.
Frankly, this feels like a “break glass in case of emergency” candidate, similar to Kitchens last season. Given his results to date, his name attached to the search seems a bit of a red flag. Add his probable inability to assert his opinion when it runs counter to Belichick and Lombardi, and Decker running the UNC offense next season likely yields last season’s schematics with marginally improved talent.
You Gotta Be Kidding Me: Mick Lombardi
Mick Lombardi got his coaching start at Fordham for two seasons as a coaching assistant. That’s the extent of his college experience. He then spent six years with the 49ers and Jets in off-field assistant roles. On-field coaching finally happened with the Patriots in 2020. Lombardi followed Josh McDaniels to the NFL’s Raiders in 2022, where he filled the offensive coordinator role for a season and half. The Raiders dismissed Lombardi along with McDaniels mid-season 2023. Lombardi then landed back with the 49ers in an off-field position last season before being promoted to QB coach this year.
The salary pool allocated for assistant coaches was meant to aim far higher than that resume. If Belichick and Lombardi bring yet another blood relative onto staff at a salary level equal to some of the sport’s biggest names, expect a fire storm of outrage. The only reason his name’s circulating in connection to this job is his last name.
