What the Bill Belichick-UNC situation reveals about how college coaching searches work

College football coaching searches don’t operate like most normal hiring processes, because college athletics isn’t a normal industry. The athletic director typically makes the hiring decision, but a school board must often approve the contract. And before the hire is made, anyone from donors to other school officials may push for someone else.

At North Carolina, clashing power dynamics involving athletic director Bubba Cunningham and school officials have created what industry sources described as a messy start to the search, following a messy end to former coach Mack Brown’s tenure. Former New England Patriots coach Bill Belichick has spoken with UNC officials, The Athletic has reported, but how interested either side truly is remains to be seen.

That the news of a Super Bowl-winning coach’s participation got out at all and has lingered amid an uncertain reality highlights what happens when there isn’t full alignment during a search. Information control is not a given when one of the university’s most visible jobs is open.

For insight into how coaching searches work and how ADs balance the opinions of university stakeholders, The Athletic spoke with four ADs about what goes on behind the scenes. They were granted anonymity in order to speak candidly about the related challenges they face in their jobs, even though they couldn’t speak to the specifics of the situation in Chapel Hill.

“Bubba’s a pro, but one of the most critical pieces of being an athletic director is communication and managing up,” one AD said of UNC. “Depending on the structure of your university, it’s making sure (other leaders are) engaged and informed but not running the show. That is a very, very thin line.”

Multiple ADs saw UNC’s trustees calling for an audit of the athletic department in the spring as a sign of a divide. The school’s interim chancellor came to Cunningham’s defense days later.

Then in November, Brown said he planned to return next season before speaking to Cunningham about his future, which felt to these ADs like a public attempt by the head coach to rally support. Brown was fired days before the season finale against NC State. Cunningham said Brown didn’t want to announce a retirement the day before the game, so Cunningham made the call from Hawaii while with the men’s basketball team at the Maui Invitational. Board chairman John Preyer said the way Cunningham handled Brown’s exit was “shameful.”

School or donor involvement in coaching changes is nothing new. Presidents and board chairs are typically kept in the loop, but trustees approve contracts and donors often control the purse strings when it comes to facilities, coaches and now players. Sometimes they want a big name; other times they want a certain program alumnus. Another AD recounted a time when a donor offered to pay the full salary of a certain coach if the AD hired him. The AD wasn’t interested, and it caused a rift with the donor.

“Donors will say you should hire such and such, but first, some of (those coaches) aren’t coming,” the second AD said. “People sometimes make it bigger than it is. Social media doesn’t help. We as ADs and presidents have to be very secure about how we’re going down a path and doing it for the right reasons, with the right information and right context.”

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When an athletic director goes with someone else, that AD has to be ready to defend the decision.

“I want to know everything about a candidate before I step into a conversation with a donor, a regent, a president, because you have to be able to say why this may not be the best approach,” the second AD said.

Added a third AD, “It gets weird when you need a donor or two writing big checks to create the opening or fund the replacement because the quid pro quo for that check is often a voice in the outcome.”

Each school’s donor involvement can be different. Some donors stay out. Some want to be involved. ADs need to keep the circle small, knowing if they respond to the questions of one donor, others will want answers, too. Some coaching candidates don’t want to talk with donors during the search, for fear of a leak.

The pool for any coaching hire always starts large before thinning out. Every AD keeps a list of potential replacements in the event they need to hire a new coach. But search firms and agents offer more names, and ADs send out feelers to see if any unexpected names might be interested.

The first AD said they research 25-30 candidates, have phone calls with 10 to 15, conduct a Zoom interview with six to eight and interview one to three in person at the end. As a result, public reporting on candidates can sometimes lack full context.

After ESPN’s Adam Schefter reported that Hall of Fame linebacker Ray Lewis had emerged as a candidate for the open head coaching job at Florida Atlantic, The Athletic reported he was not considered a serious candidate. The school hired Texas Tech offensive coordinator Zach Kittley this week.

“You need to have somebody in your camp monitoring social media, message boards, national media to give you a sense of (what people are saying),” the first AD said.

But they can’t respond to various rumors.

“You can’t waste time worrying or acknowledging it,” a fourth AD said. “You have to stick to your process.”

As for Belichick specifically, all three ADs said they had questions not about Belichick’s X’s-and-O’s acumen but about his ability to adapt to the college game. While the amateurism model is all but out the window with the introduction of an open name, image and likeness compensation market, college football is still not a professional sport.

“We don’t have the structure to retain talent, manage contracts and manage rosters; it’s a free-for-all,” the fourth AD said. “You have to manage chaos on a yearly basis. NFL free agency is nothing like the college level.”

“Does he have the energy and drive?” the second AD said. “It’s been three decades since he coached in college. Can he connect with players today? He struggled with that his last few years with the Patriots. What type of staff is he putting together?”

Belichick’s son Steve is Washington’s defensive coordinator, and a program source told The Athletic on Thursday that Bill Belichick has been around the program consistently “and got a very up-close, in-depth look at what today’s college football looks like now.” The source added that Belichick has seen his scheme being run in college and that college players can make it work.

As for the rest of the UNC search, Pittsburgh Steelers offensive coordinator and program alum Arthur Smith has said he’s staying in the NFL after his name was floated early on. UNC is expected to make a push for Tulane coach Jon Sumrall now that Tulane’s regular season is over after Friday night’s AAC championship game loss. The list of other names expected to be in the mix includes Georgia defensive coordinator Glenn Schumann, Army head coach Jeff Monken and potentially Iowa State head coach Matt Campbell, all of whom have conference championship games this weekend.

Regardless of UNC’s situation, every AD agreed that maintaining rapport with your stakeholders is essential to running a clean and effective search. There has to be trust. No coaching hire is a guaranteed success, but a messy search process rarely produces the right result.

“Relationships matter,” the third AD said. “You build relationships with key constituents over months and years and trust in those relationships to manage input on a search.”

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