Mack Brown put some legendarily bad defenses on the field at UNC. He did it across multiple coordinators. He did it in parallel with some of the best offensive talent this program has ever seen. That combination of electric offense and woeful defense led to frustrating games watching Drake and Omarion, or Sam and Josh, try to outscore the other team every Saturday. One thing we all said when Bill Belichick was hired: “Well, at least the defense will finally be respectable.”
Yeah, about that. It’s
not.
I didn’t expect a Super Bowl defense out of the gate. I didn’t expect a defense on par with some of Nick Saban’s best. I didn’t expect the best defense in the ACC. I didn’t even expect a top 3 defense in the ACC, not in year one.
I did expect a defense better than anything Mack Brown ever put on the field.
This is a look at the numbers. Are the safeties taking better angles? Does defensive line technique seem more solid? Yes, we could cherry-pick some of this year’s best plays and compare them to prior years’ worst plays to claim, “We’re on the right path!” The numbers, however, don’t lie. Through 5 games, this defense hasn’t performed any better than last year’s defense overall. In a couple of categories, it’s worse.
The raw numbers are bad:
A defense in the bottom third of the ACC is not what I had in mind when we broke the bank to hire a coach with a reputation for defensive genius, even in year one. My first thought looking at the 2025 numbers was, “These include games against UNC Charlotte (133rd in offense, FBS), and Richmond (98th in offense, FCS). Those are probably boosting our numbers here a bit.” My second thought was, “Even against P4 teams, our defense has faced a lot of garbage time, meaning back ups and generic offensive looks. That probably helps these numbers a bit, too.” My third thought was, “I bet adjusted stats, which take opponent strength and garbage time into account, look even worse for us.”
Yep. The adjusted stats are even worse:
2025’s Tar Heel defense has been genuinely awful. Thank God for Stanford and Boston College, I guess? The most frustrating thing about the defense’s performance has to be the fact that it’s being coached by not one, not two, but three Belichicks. The last time we saw a family tree this involved with a college unit was FSU’s offense under the Bowdens. They racked up points, sent guys to New York City as Heisman finalists, and launched Tommy’s and Terry’s unfortunate head coaching careers. This Belichickian defense, on the other hand, looks no better than Mack Brown’s.
The following table shows UNC’s defensive ranks 2019-2023 in four different measures.
So far, which of those defenses is 2025’s better than? 2022’s? Well, sure. Bars don’t come any lower than that. 2021? Barely. Is it better than 2023’s or 2024’s? Not yet.
The next seven games provide plenty of opportunity for the defense to get better. TCU ranks as the best offense we’ll face all year, closely followed by Virginia. California’s offense has been either spectacular or awful, with an average that puts it slightly above UNC’s offense. Stanford and Wake Forest have shown flashes, but their overall offensive efforts grade well below average. Syracuse has lost its starting QB for the year. Meanwhile, NC State and Duke both have respectable top-30 offenses. If UNC’s defense shows steady improvement the rest of the way and balls out against two good (not great) rival offenses to close the year, perhaps Belichick will restore some of his reputation for coaching defense. Even then, that would only elevate the 2025 defense to “Jay Bateman” territory.
A possibility on the other end of the spectrum would be a locker room by Halloween that’s done with the drama and reported divisions. See: FSU 2024. It’s also a locker room filled—by Bill’s and Mike’s choice—with transfers who probably don’t have the same kind of passion for the State and Duke games that close the season. In that reality, the defense could end up in “Chizik 2.0” territory. What doesn’t seem possible in any reality would be a defense that ends up in “Bill Belichick, defensive genius” territory.
UNC shelled out top dollar for great defense. Instead, we’re getting no better than what we got with Mack.
$10 million for a head coach. $2 million more than Curt Cignetti, who took his team to the playoffs in year one.
$1.5 million for Mike Lombardi. $1 million more than Texas Tech’s GM, currently ranked #9 and grabbing elite recruits left and right.
$1.3 million for Steve Belichick. $500,000 more than Ron English at Louisville (ACC leader in total defense).
$500,000 for Brian Belichick. $175,000 more than Steve Ellis at Louisville (ACC’s leader in pass defense).
When you pair bad defense with great offenses and home-grown QBs, like Mack did, you get a lot of fan frustration. “Just give us an average defense to go with those offenses,” we begged. That frustration served as a significant catalyst to the excitement surrounding Belichick’s hire.
Instead, Belichick, aided by his two sons, has put together a defense no better than the prior UNC staff, despite significantly more resources. That reeks of apathy borne of arrogance. To make matters even worse, Bill’s pairing it with an offense as inept as the 2022 defense. That’s why the stands are empty as the rest of CFB howls in laughter. This team, to date, has proven even worse than all the ones that had us begging UNC to finally get serious about football. Well, UNC did. They just hired coaches who apparently aren’t.
