CHAPEL HILL — Bill Belichick earned his reputation as a detail-oriented, no-nonsense winner, leading the New England Patriots to six Super Bowl titles.
That’s the Belichick many of his North Carolina football players were expecting when they met him shortly after he was hired in December. Instead, they found someone slightly different.
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“The first meeting you’re expecting to be serious, 100% locked in. He comes in, he introduces himself and then he busts a joke,” sophomore wide receiver Jordan Shipp said.
That sense of humor has been among the biggest surprises for the Tar Heels in Belichick’s first months on the job. Sure, Belichick is serious, focused on the details and preaching fundamentals and competition at every turn, but he hasn’t been afraid to show a different side.
“He jokes with us,” Shipp said. “He laughs with us. We’ll laugh in meetings. He has that human side to him.”
Said defensive back Will Hardy: "When it's serious, he's serious. But there are times when he'll crack a joke out of nowhere and him being kind of monotone sometimes will make those jokes so funny."
UNC players spoke to the media Tuesday for the first time since before Mack Brown was fired and Belichick was hired, a move that has elevated the profile of the Tar Heels’ program as much for off-the-field news involving Belichick’s girlfriend Jordon Hudson as for anything UNC has done in shoulder pads.
“She doesn’t have any role in the UNC football program,” Belichick said Tuesday. “There’s been noise out there about a lot of different things. Our focus is, day-to-day, getting better.”
The intense coverage of all things Jordon — the 24-year-old Hudson, a former college competitive cheerleader and beauty pageant contestant, and Belichick, 73, have both a “personal and professional” relationship, according to him — hasn’t pierced through the bubble of the team, players said.
“Outside noise is a part of playing college football that just comes with the territory,” offensive lineman Christo Kelly said. “It doesn’t really have an effect on us or the day to day. We’re really just focused on competing, getting better.”
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Kelly was Belichick’s first transfer. He was an All-Patriot League performer at Holy Cross, where Belichick’s daughter, Amanda, coaches the women’s lacrosse team. Amanda Belichick helped connect Kelly with her famous dad.
“It was a perfect fit,” he said.
Any intimidation that Kelly and other players might have felt in the presence of Belichick, a dominant NFL figure for longer than most of them have been alive, went away quickly.
“Maybe at first, when you see him, all you see is the Super Bowls that he’s won,” Kelly said. “But when you get here, you see the way he cares. You see the way that he approaches the game. You see how hard he works. There’s no question of why he has the success that he has. The attention to detail, the emphasis on the fundamentals and really just kind of creating competition for the guys.”
It’s that resume that attracted North Carolina to Belichick, who had never coached in college and led them to sign him to a five-year, $50-million contract. It is also what has brought along players, like Washington transfer defensive back Thaddeus Dixon. Steve Belichick, the Tar Heels’ defensive coordinator, was Washington’s defensive coordinator last season.
Dixon and Bill Belichick had a few conversations last season.
“Him, as a coach himself, had a bigger impact than the stuff he told me last year,” said Dixon, who played in the 2023 national title game with Washington. “I really just wanted the opportunity just to learn from somebody like that [who] has been in the league for so long. Just the opportunity to learn is bigger than anything.”
Several players called him “the greatest coach of all time.”
The Tar Heels overhauled their roster in the offseason, as is typical with any new coaching hire. Belichick said about two-thirds of the roster will be new in 2025. Some players didn’t need much convincing to stick around for another year.
“[There are] a lot of things Coach Belichick doesn’t need to say personally, to me, that shows the success he has had, players he’s coached in the NFL,” Hardy said. “Initially. seeing that was amazing. That’s an easy sell for me.”
Hardy said Belichick has pointed out small details in line play and pulled him to the side during practice to explain an aspect of defensive back play, showing his command of each position. In team meetings, Hardy said, Belichick won’t hesitate to call out a player in front of the whole team.
“You got to just say, yes, sir, right?” Hardy said. “There’s no hiding in that respect.”
Belichick said the Tar Heels have been easy to coach. UNC opens its season — and the Belichick era — on Labor Day night at home against TCU.
“These are great kids to work with,” he said. “They really are. They’ve got great buy-in. There have been really no problems at all. These guys are on time. They’re early. They work hard. They put in the work in the weight room, out on the field. They spend time on their own, whether it’s extra training or coming over and watching film and that type of thing. They’ve made a ton of improvement. These guys are a lot better than they were when we started in January on every level.”