College football is currently dealing with a raft of would-be NFL players attempting to return to school. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Bill Belichick is interested.
Belichick admitted Friday that the North Carolina Tar Heels have preliminarily looked into adding some of the 16 players who received a fifth year of eligibility through a temporary restraining order. A number of those players have spent time in NFL training camps this summer, but suddenly have a route back to college.
“We’ve looked at a number of them,” Belichick said, via Noah Weiskopf of 247 Sports. “Each case is a little bit different. If it works, it works. If it doesn’t, it doesn’t. I don’t think there’s anything we’re counting on, but we’re always open to anything that will help the team.”
A number of players have already entered the transfer portal despite being on training camp rosters in the NFL. As long as these players are released from NFL rosters by Sept. 1, they can play another year of college football, at least for the time being.
When Belichick took over the Tar Heels last year, he openly talked about running his program as if it were the 33rd NFL team. He certainly would not shy away from getting his hands on some players that are at least good enough to hang around an NFL training camp. That is especially true with North Carolina coming off a 4-8 campaign last year.
