Carolina Football Live: Development From Top to Bottom the Belichick Way

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. — On Sunday, the day after North Carolina’s 20-3 victory over Charlotte on the road, the Tar Heels held a 26-play scrimmage at Kenan Stadium.

They were live game-like reps for players who didn’t travel to Charlotte with the team or play snaps on Saturday night against the 49ers, in an effort to allow that part of the roster further chances to develop and compete.

“The players who didn’t play wanted to get out there and prove that they want to try to earn reps,” UNC general manager Michael Lombardi said Monday night on the Carolina Football Live radio show. “And when the bottom of the roster is competing to try to get reps, it makes the top of the roster have to compete to keep reps, so you have a competitive team from both ends.”

Bill Belichick’s UNC coaching staff has underlined a point about consistently improving and stacking good days throughout preseason training camp and into the early weeks of the 2025 season. But some of the information Lombardi offered Monday night on the radio show shed new light on just how the Tar Heels have gone about developing and evaluating players early on under Belichick.

One of the main tools Lombardi mentioned was a process the team has deemed Basic. After every UNC practice, the coaching staff has younger players compete while being taped on film. Then, the coaching staff, including Belichick, will review the footage and have conversations about which players perhaps are earning playing time or potentially moving themselves up the depth chart.

Among the players Lombardi highlighted from the past week was freshman running back Demon June. Through practice performance, June was able to earn his way onto the game field and make his college debut against Charlotte. And he responded by rushing for a game-high 52 yards on nine carries and a collection of hardworking runs.

“He has done a really good job of every rep he’s gotten,” Lombardi said Monday night. “He’s taken full advantage of it. I really was impressed with him and how he played, and hopefully he’s going to get more. You know, the greatest reward for doing is the opportunity to do more.”

Lombardi also mentioned the role of scout team players and how UNC’s philosophy won’t neglect their development. So by the end of the season, a player who may have been a long way off from contributing will be ready should injuries occur.

He said there’s often a misconception around practice players open the fringes in college. From the viewpoint of the NFL, it’s not uncommon for a player on the 53-man roster to lose his spot on the active roster to another player who has outperformed them during practices. Bringing this thinking to the Tar Heels has fostered a competitive environment throughout the depth chart, and allows deserving players to rise to the surface across the course of a season.

“(In the NFL) you could lose your job at any moment if you didn’t practice well enough,” Lombardi said. “Well, it’s the same thing in college if you don’t practice. Some guys had good weeks of practice, they’re going to move up. And so you have to make it a competitive environment every single day. Because if we just go out there and everybody has a great practice that’s called rehearsal, that’s not practice, right? Rehearsal is you do things perfectly. Practice is you make mistakes and you learn about it.”

The commitment to developing players isn’t only how Belichick and Lombardi have rebranded the UNC program, but also an effort toward evaluating all of the talent at the coaching staff’s disposal. With the key figure being 70 new players on the roster, Belichick has said how it could take three to four game weeks before coaches have a full grasp of who truly belongs on the field for the Tar Heels.

“We don’t know what everybody’s real strengths and weaknesses are,” Lombardi said. “We’re learning about the players like they’re learning about us. It’s a two-way street. Coach (Bill) Walsh used to say all the time, ‘We have to give the players a chance to be the players that they can be. We just can’t make them the player we want them to be.’

“So we’re running the offense to tailor to what we can do and take advantage of the opponent based on what our strengths are. That’s the key. That’s been Bill’s strength his whole life. How do we have to play the game to win? And what’s our strength against their strength?”