Heel Tough Blog: Tar Heels Drop The Ball With No Spring Game

UNC Athletics

The Tar Heels reportedly took some steps on the field this spring, but the staff and athletic department made a major mistake off of it.

The team held its final scrimmage to close out spring ball on Friday night, but did so in front of an empty Kenan Stadium. This was certainly a choice from whoever made this decision, especially with where the program is at after just one season under Belichick.

Last year’s ‘Practice Like a Pro’ event was frustrating from both a media and fan perspective because you didn’t have the numbers on the jersey, but at least you got a look at the team and could form some surface level opinions about the team that you were getting ready to cover and, in the fans cases, pay to watch.

If they had decided to not have a spring game last offseason, it really wouldn’t have mattered. The hype around the program was at a point that may have never been seen before following the hire of arguably the greatest coach in the history of the NFL and there would be so much roster turnover from the spring to the fall that it would have made sense if they would have wanted to wait until their team was complete before taking the field for the fans.

This year is much different than last year, though. Following an extremely disappointing 4-8 season, a significant portion of the fanbase seems to, at the least, be questioning the direction of the program and need a reason to buy in. With numbers back on the jerseys and the roster about 90% in place according to Belichick earlier in the spring, another ‘Practice Like a Pro’ type of event or a full out scrimmage might have been able to do that. It would have given the fans a look at Bobby Petrino’s offense that is reportedly ahead of the defense and served as a nice first test for the roster that is reportedly already showing more than the team did a year ago when they were on the field in the fall.

Instead, the staff and athletic department decided to do what they’ve done best under Belichick and keep everything under wraps. With how limited the viewing windows have been in practice, it feels like Tar Heel fans are more in the dark than any other fanbase in the country when it comes to knowledge about their football team. The fans are left to read the news and notes from Inside Carolina and TarHeel247 that are handcuffed with small amounts of information in their own right, meaning we likely head to Ireland with very few answers to the questions that we have about this year’s team. That is incredibly frustrating and could lead to low attendance out of the gate for this program, something they don’t need in what feels like a pretty crucial season for Belichick and the program.

To put it simply, they dropped the ball here on something that could have been such an easy win this offseason.