Bill Belichick noncommittal to Gio Lopez as UNC's starting quarterback for Week 2: 'We'll see'

Coming out of a disaster of a season debut, North Carolina could have a re-opened quarterback competition. That’s in part because of the unknown status of QB Gio Lopez, but also is related to the reserve play of QB Max Johnson.

Following the 48-14 loss for UNC to TCU, Bill Belichick was asked whether Lopez would be the Tar Heels’ QB1 this weekend in their second game. He was undecided, with some of that being because he didn’t know where Lopez was health-wise with only five days in between games playing on Labor Day night before kicking off at Charlotte next.

“I don’t know. It’s a short week. We’ll see,” said Belichick. “I don’t know where his availability is right now, so I don’t want to speculate on that.”

Lopez, a redshirt sophomore who transferred in from South Alabama, was not playing well regardless, much like the rest of the team in their opening outing. He finished the night at 4-10 for 69 yards, took two sacks, and had a pair of turnovers with a pick-six and a lost fumble. That said, he also exited in the third quarter of last night’s loss, during that fumble after a sack taken, with an undisclosed injury, which brings his availability into question anyway for Saturday.

“Yeah, we’ll see how Gio is,” Belichick said of Lopez’s status. “You know, they took him off, took a look at him. Hopefully he’s not too bad but we’ll see.”

At that point, Johnson, the sixth-year quarterback coming off his own season-ending injury from last fall in his first year at UNC, came in and played well, although facing a 35-point deficit when he got in. He went 9-11 for 103 yards and a touchdown, with Belichick appreciating him and his play in the midst of all that last night.

“You know, give Max a lot of credit. You know, he came in there after, you know, being off for a long time and, you know, hung in there, made some throws in, you know, a tough situation,” said Belichick. “So, give him a lot of credit for what he did tonight.”

Again, much of this is due to the short window they have from game one to game two, with Lopez’s unknown injury further complicating that. That’s why, postgame, Belichick didn’t yet have an answer of who will be the Tar Heels’ starting quarterback this weekend against the 49ers.

“We’ll take a look at it after we see where things are at here and go from there,” Belichick said. “I don’t know. It’s too early to tell now.”