Bill Belichick's decision to take his first college coaching job at age 73 is one of college football's biggest offseason storylines. Given the makeup of his staff, plenty have assumed that a Belichick will be coaching the Tar Heels for the forseeable future, even after Bill ultimately departs, whether through retirement or a return to the NFL.

Steve Belichick, who beat his father to the college ranks by a year after serving as defensive coordinator at Washington in 2024, will hold the same position for his father this fall. The younger Belichick previously worked under his father in a variety of defensive roles with the New England Patriots, and will now lead his first college defense, and will make $1.3 million this fall according to WRAL. However, the full terms of his contract are not yet known and, according to the Ovies & Giglio podcast, FOIA requests for the deal have been denied, spurning rumors that it could be because of "coach in waiting" language.

After a lawyer checked in on behalf of Ovies & Giglio on why Stephen Belichick's contract has not yet been made available, he was told that it is because athletic director Bubba Cunningham has not yet signed it. Joe Giglio said then reached out directly to Cunningham about the issue, who responded that he would "check on that." He then addressed the "coach in waiting" rumors directly, saying that a clause to that end is "not something that is in his contract" and "that is not something we've even discussed."

"Given our relationship with Bubba, I have no reason to think why he would lie to us," he added.

Now, as is said in the clip by Matt Brown of Extra Points, there doesn't have to necessarily be a written agreement. The two sides could have a handshake deal, and Cunningham could have misled Giglio, though it would be a bad look to so blatantly lie.

Of course, if the Tar Heels defense excels and the Tar Heels choose to promote Steve once his father leaves the job, we may never know whether there was a true arrangement, if the UNC brass only decided through the process of finding their next coach that he was the right guy or if there was some sort of informal agreement that he would get an opportunity at the job if things broke right.

Both he and his father have plenty of work to do on the gridiron in 2025 to set the stage for that sort of handoff, no matter what the truth is.

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This article was originally published on www.si.com as UNC AD Responds to Steve Belichick 'Coach in Waiting' Rumors Amid Contract Speculation.

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