The Tar Heels search for their newest head football coach continues to drag on. Despite feeling like we’ve been on the doorstep of a resolution since Saturday night, the program remains without someone steering the ship as the transfer portal has officially opened.
Because the team remains in uncertain hands right now, they have lost three starters to the transfer portal who want to leave options open with no answer as to who they’ll be playing for if they stay.
According to Jonathan Jones of CBS Sports, the belief of some close to the situation is that salary and NIL commitments are some of the biggest obstacles standing in the way of the deal actually getting done. This lines up with what Pete Thamel and Chris Low of ESPN reported earlier in the day where they included the role of his son, Stephen, and staff resources.
While many have hinted that things are near the finish line, Andrew Carter of the News & Observer says that a resolution isn’t imminent, something that shouldn’t be shocking considering the women’s soccer team played for an NCAA title tonight down the road in Cary, which athletic director Bubba Cunningham was in attendance for.
To be fair, some of the reporting throughout the day has to make you wonder just how much control over this decision Cunningham has. Thamel and Low said this morning that those around the search described it as “scattered”, which might be putting it lightly. According to their sources, it is not clear as to who is actually conducting the search and making the decisions.
Brian Murphy of WRAL is hearing similar things, saying that a source has told him that a decision would be made if not for “antics of board members becoming involved in the process and causing confusion”.
The guy who is reportedly to be causing the biggest issues is Board of Trustees member John P. Preyer who expressed his frustrations with Cunningham after the firing of Mack Brown.
As of right now, it appears that the attention remains fully on coming to an agreement with Bill Belichick with names like Steve Wilks and interim coach Freddie Kitchens hanging around in the background if that plan is to fall through.
The longer this takes, the harder it is going to make it for the new coach to keep and acquire the talent needed to compete immediately as it seems the decision makers want to do based on who they’ve targeted. The Board of Trustees, especially Preyer who is seeming to cause issues just to stall this as a form of protest, needs to step aside and let Cunningham and Chancellor Lee Roberts do what they need to so that they can close out this deal with Belichick and allow the program to start generating some momentum.
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