Last year, North Carolina G.M. Mike Lombardi crowed that the Tar Heels were the NFL’s 33rd franchise. The other 32 had no interest in any of their draft-eligible players.

None of the players from the first year of the Bill Belichick tenure at Chapel Hill were among the 257 draft picks from the 2026 selection process.

None. As in not one. And they arrived in time to take advantage of the transfer portal to find one-year players who would then exit for the NFL. Given that it was too late to put together a strong class of incoming freshmen, they were even more likely to seek and find established players.

That was the basic problem with the program in 2025. They didn't have enough good players. And it was Lombardi's job to find them.

Between finding them and coaching them up, Belichick and company didn't do enough to get any of them drafted.