Mack Brown says UNC has lowered academic standards, notes "absolutely no reason" Bill Belichick shouldn't be successful"

There was no way for North Carolina to understand the full scope of the distractions that have popped up about Bill Belichick's personal life before they brought him to campus as their new head, but nonetheless the Tar Heels made arguably the biggest splash of the hiring cycle by hiring the former Patriots head coach.

Belichick, along with longtime right-hand Michael Lombardi as his GM, went to work quickly to revamp UNC, bringing in around 60 transfers to overhaul the Tar Heels roster to capitalize on the momentum his hire brought to Chapel Hill to replace college coaching icon Mack Brown.

In an interview Brown gave to Sirius XM College Sports Radio today, the Hall of Famer described the split between him and the Tar Heels as a "divorce," saying it was time for both them and him, pointing to their inability to recruit the type of talent they had early on during his second stint leading the program, sharing that NIL resources were at least part of the reason for that.

"It was best for me to get out. We had always built programs on fit and in our last couple years there we were having to get parents with money, and we were trying to get kids with over a 3.0 because that's who we could get. We signed 26 kids in our next-to-last year at North Carolina, high school players, and didn't pay them a penny. So I felt guilty."

Brown would go on the share that Omarion Hampton was offered over a million dollars by another program to leave, and while Brown told him he should absolutely take that offer, they were somehow able to keep him at UNC while paying him around $300k.

Then, speaking of those high academic standards that were in place during his tenure, Brown went on to share that he expects Bill Belichick to have quick success with his former program.

"Now, with Bill Belichick, who is likely the greatest coach ever, they've committed money to it, they've helped him with academics and they've lowered those standards some, so there is absolutely no reason why they shouldn't be successful." 

Brown goes on to share during the course of the interview, while it would be difficult to get passed, he believes student-athletes should have to stay at a school for two seasons, sharing a stat that if you transfer once the odds of that player graduating decreases to 63% because a lot of times their credits don't transfer. The kids transferring three and four times are very likely to not graduate, greatly impacting their future job prospects, he contends.

Hear from Brown in the clip.