We are close to 24 hours away from the North Carolina Tar Heels taking the field in Dublin, Ireland against TCU. The Tar Heel Blog staff has been bracing for whatever could potentially happen during the 2026 season, which is a challenge because I don’t think anybody really knows what we’re preparing for. Even pessimism is met with some level of curiosity as far as what could happen, but let’s be clear: the pessimism is pretty high. How do I know? Our staff is drowning in it.
As we do every year, we asked
our staff to give their predictions for the 2026 Carolina football season. Here were the results:
To start, a majority of our staff nominated Jordan Shipp as Offensive MVP, and Melkart Abou Jaoude as Defensive MVP. These are the most sensible choices — Shipp is the only offensives player we know has a reliably positive impact on the team, and Abou Jaoude was Second Team All-ACC during his redshirt junior season. As far as the biggest surprise players, the results were all over the place, but wide receiver Mason Humphrey received a majority of the votes.
Getting into the season record predictions, things are much darker than last season. Many staff members thought the Heels would win at least eight games last season, but this year we almost unanimously agreed that this could be a sub-.500 team. Well, except Max — our king of optimism has the Heels winning eight games, which…is a take that exists. But hey, he could end up being right while the rest of us end up with egg on our faces. It could happen, right?
Looking at best win of the season, the Duke game received the most votes. Clemson and Syracuse also received a couple of votes, which it would be hilarious if somehow the Heels found a way to take down the Tigers. When it comes to worst win, though, UConn had the most votes. Considering the fact that it’s difficult to remember that the Huskies even have a football team, this would be a major blow to Bill Belichick’s squad.
Here is where we speed some things up: nobody on staff thinks UNC will make it to the ACC title game, win the ACC, win all their in-state games, or finish top 10. As far as bold predictions go, my personal favorite is that Bill Belichick gets fired in the middle of the season. It wouldn’t be the most ideal situation, but at the same time, the circus needs to come to an end sooner rather than later. Finally, the non-ACC team worth watching this season is Miami by a slim margin. There’s truly no wrong answer, though — there are a good amount of teams that will probably provide higher quality football than the Tar Heels this season.
Now that we have shared our thoughts about what we’re expecting this season, what are your predictions? Are you more optimistic than our staff? Also, what is your bold prediction of the season? Let us know in the comments below.
