Carolina football finished No. 11 in the recruiting class of 2022.

With only 17 players signed, Mack Brown and his staff still finished very close to a top ten dominated by the so-called ‘football schools’ from the Power 5 conferences. UNC followed Texas A&M, Alabama, Georgia, Ohio State, Texas, Penn State, Notre Dame, Oklahoma, Michigan and Clemson.

None of the “Best 10” signed fewer than 20 freshmen or transfers, with Texas A&M (30), national champion Georgia (29) and Texas (28) landing the most new players.

The Tar Heels did it with 17 based on the number of 5-star and 4-stars they signed, from offensive tackle Zach Rice to defensive lineman Travis Shaw.

Brown has picked up where he left off in his first stint in Chapel Hill, building top ten teams before an offer he couldn’t refuse lured him to Austin in 1997. Now, on the back of two excellent recruiting classes, Carolina could be selective even while losing players already in the program to the transfer portal.

However, developing athletes (even the 3-stars) is still important to the strength and longevity of any program. Take the most highly-rated recruit in UNC history, defensive tackle Marvin Austin, who came in under Butch Davis and left in all kinds of trouble and washed out of the NFL after only four years. Austin is perhaps the poster child for not counting your draft bonus money until you can prove you can play in the league. After all, hard-working lower draft picks and free agents may come out of college hungrier to make it as pros.

Two other 5-stars signed by Brown are on the 2022 roster, starting junior DB Tony Grimes and red-shirt freshman D-lineman Keeshawn Silver. So, as they say, it takes a village to build and sustain a great program, and the NIL-induced transfer portal is not helping.

Brown is still recruiting a few more transfers to replace the 10 players who left, like veteran WR Beau Corrales and LB Eugene Asante, but it is getting late to have kids admitted to summer school with the rest of the incoming freshmen and transfers who haven’t enrolled yet.

 

Featured image via UNC Athletic Communications/Matthew Fedder

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