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Carolina has to play another game of roulette with its quarterbacks.
It happened twice before in Mack Brown’s second stint at UNC, having a freshman quarterback beating out older guys to start the first game. For the 2024 season, it is graduate transfer Max Johnson and redshirt sophomore Conner Harrell.
In 2019, true freshman Sam Howell won the job from redshirt frosh Cade Fortin and Jace Ruder. In 2022, redshirt freshman Drake Maye beat out red-shirt sophomore Jacolby Criswell. In both cases a more talented but less experienced player started the first game.
Only this spring, the transfer portal is in full swing, and Harrell will have to at least consider leaving UNC for a school where he may play more if Johnson, with two years of eligibility left, wins the starting job for Minnesota on Thursday night, August 29, on ESPN.
“We’re eight days away from the portal on the 16th,” Brown said this week when asked about his potential dilemma. “And we won’t even play our spring game till the 20th. So we could have somebody leave the 16th and not be here for the game. We could have somebody tell somebody they’re going into the portal on the 20th, play in the spring game and walk into my office afterwards, ‘I’m outta here. I’m going to the portal.’”
Johnson has already transferred twice (from LSU and Texas A&M) so UNC will be his last school. Harrell will be the one facing the decision if he doesn’t win the job after summer training camp, when the portal will be open again.
The 6-5, 225-pound Johnson has started 22 games in the SEC. Harrell has started one game (against West Virginia in Mayo Bowl), but Brown says he is capable of being a good college quarterback.
“You try to keep an open conversation with them,” Brown continued. “And at the same time, we’re in the kid business, so we want what’s best for the kid. And like our past quarterbacks, we don’t know which is gonna start.”
Clearly, he likes both and their talents and says has been “dreadfully honest with every young person trying to tell him exactly what we see and where you stand here and if you don’t feel good about this and you don’t think you can change it, then let’s help you go somewhere else. We try to help every young person, and that’s some tough conversations, but it’s been good.”
Brown has an idea who his next quarterback will be if Harrell leaves or should Johnson get hurt, but adds, “We’re trying to get a first right now and trying to get two that can play until we get to a third.”
Featured image via Associated Press/Chris Carlson
Art Chansky is a veteran journalist who has written ten books, including best-sellers “Game Changers,” “Blue Bloods,” and “The Dean’s List.” He has contributed to WCHL for decades, having made his first appearance as a student in 1971. His “Sports Notebook” commentary airs daily on the 97.9 The Hill WCHL and his “Art’s Angle” opinion column runs weekly on Chapelboro.Chapelboro.com does not charge subscription fees, and you can directly support our efforts in local journalism here. Want more of what you see on Chapelboro? Let us bring free local news and community information to you by signing up for our newsletter.
Coaching is pretty tough when you genuinely care about young men as Coach Brown clearly does.