2025 North Carolina Football Predictions: Tar Heels Ranked 35th in RJ Young's Ultimate 136

By RJ Young
Published

This isn't your average college football ranking.

My Ultimate 136 is a set of rankings that is fluid, but it's my job to look ahead and make a claim for all FBS teams based on what I know and why I know it. Here are the three pressing questions I started by asking when putting together this list:

  • Who do I think is good?
  • Why do I think they're good?
  • What are the chances they will finish above or below my expectations?

Here is a look at where UNC lands in my Ultimate 136.

Team ranking: 35
Last year’s ranking: 46
Top player: LB Andrew Simpson: 25 starts in three seasons at Boise State; named to the Dick Butkus Award preseason Watch List.

[North Carolina's 2025 schedule]

RJ’s take: I'll stick to what I wrote about Bill Belichick and the Tar Heels in December: "Belichick is one of the best NFL coaches who has ever lived, certainly the best ever in the salary cap era. However, at 72, he's a relative novice in this sport.

"There are those obvious figures like Jimmy Johnson, Barry Switzer and Pete Carroll. All of them were head coaches in the NFL and at the Power 4 level. Each won at least one Super Bowl and a national title.

"But what Belichick is attempting to do is more like what Deion Sanders has done at Colorado. Belichick is a coach with a once-in-a-lifetime résumé but with no head-coaching experience in college who will take over a program that lacks an identity apart from some success with Mack Brown. He's building an NFL-style coaching staff and hopes to hit the ground running with a roster culled from the transfer portal. It took Sanders one year at Colorado to get it right. After a 4-8 first season, his Buffaloes finished 9-3 and produced a Heisman Trophy winner in Year 2.

"I dare Bill Belichick to do better."

Stand on it.

North Carolina Win Total Odds: Over 7.5 (+136) Under 7.5 (-168)

Have an issue with my rankings? Think your alma mater is too low, or your school's rival is too high? Get at me on X, @RJ_Young, and I'll select my favorite tweets and respond to them in a future article.

RJ Young is a national college football writer and analyst for FOX Sports. Follow him at @RJ_Young.

[Check out RJ Young's Ultimate 136 College Football Rankings here]