Bill Belichick confirms 'Belichick factor' is real at UNC with hot recruiting start

Say this for the North Carolina Tar Heels: They certainly won the news cycle. Landing Bill Belichick ensured that the college football world would revolve around Chapel Hill, arguably the greatest coach in football history coming to the college ranks for the first time in his career. Belichick's resume (six Super Bowl titles, second on the all-time wins list) and his Rolodex speak for themselves, and the hire put UNC on the football map in a way that just about nobody else could.

But while headlines are all well and gone, none of that will have much of anything to do with whether Belichick ultimately succeeds or fails at Carolina. Contending with Clemson in the ACC and building a College Football Playoff contender will come down to talent: how much of it Belichick is able to land, and how well he and his coaching staff develop it. It's still very early days, obviously, but initial signs are encouraging.

Bill Belichick already starting to build recruiting momentum at UNC

Belichick got things started with a bang over the weekend, making four-star QB Bryce Baker his first recruiting win in Chapel Hill. A top-100 talent according to 247 and a North Carolina native, Baker is exactly the sort of player Belichick needs to land consistently if he wants to realize his goals.

And it seems like Baker could just be the first of many dominos to fall this offseason. Stopping by the Pat McAfee show on Monday afternoon, Belichick sounded like a man who's very confident about the momentum he's building on the recruiting trail — and hinted that there are more wins still to come.

"We've been talking to a number of players and we have more coming in this week as part of the portal, that closes on Sunday, so we've got guys coming in pretty much every day this week," Belichick said. "We're selling the program but, quite honestly, we've had a lot of players and agents are coming to us saying that 'We wanna be part of the program.'"

Sure enough, Belichick followed that up with his first transfer commitment, signing offensive lineman Christo Kelly from FCS Holy Cross. Obviously it's still far too early to draw any conclusions about the program that the New England Patriots legend will ultimately build, but it does seem to offer some proof of concept that both college players and high-school recruits are responding to what he's selling.