Reports: UNC's season opener against Florida A&M will be played

The season opener between North Carolina and Florida A&M will be played, after all. On Friday, reports emerged on Friday that the Rattlers were going to be short a number of players, putting the game in jeopardy.

According to various reports, the Rattlers were going to be without 20 players against UNC and have fewer than 10 offensive linemen available — and being shorthanded, especially up front, put the game in doubt. But ESPN’s Pete Thamel reported that the game will be played, according to a Florida A&M spokesperson. On3’s Matt Zenitz confirmed the news.

Tomorrow’s North Carolina-Florida A&M matchup, which had been in question due to FAMU player eligibility issues, is set to be played as scheduled, a source tells @on3sports.

First reported by @petethamel and @alisonposey14.https://t.co/Y1ueLyawm1

— Matt Zenitz (@mzenitz) August 26, 2022

Further reporting from ABC 27’s Alison Posey offered more context into the issue. Florida A&M is going to be shorthanded because certain players aren’t certified as eligible to compete yet for a variety of reasons: academics, transferring in, and more. Rattlers head coach Willie Simmons told Posey that the decision on whether or not to travel to Chapel Hill and play rests with the players who will be putting it on the line.

And apparently their decision has been made, preserving the 8 p.m. showdown with UNC on Saturday night.

As for the core issues that led to this debacle, Simmons told Posey that his players are ultimately responsible for their issues, but more help never hurts.

“The responsibility ultimately falls on the student athlete,” Simmons reportedly said, “but without support, it is really, really hard to juggle all they have to juggle and still maintain satisfactory academic progress & still compete at the highest level.”

UNC and Mack Brown are looking forward to hosting the HBCU

Although the game versus the Rattlers was already scheduled when Brown took over the program, the Tar Heels skipper wanted it to be in primetime to further showcase HBCU programs.

“Since Deion Sanders went the Jackson State, the recruiting is different now, the HBCUs are recruiting at a high level and the attention is much better, so I thought it would be great to have this game on national TV,” Brown said. “Zero Week is a real positive because very few other teams are playing so, you get full attention. We’ll have a lot of recruits this weekend… and it gives us an extra week to practice. I thought it was a home run to bring attention to start the season and have a lot of recruits in early.”

“When you look at scheduling an HBCU, Florida A&M has been one of the top programs in history,” Brown continued. “Coach (Willie) Simmons has done a tremendous job.”

Brown noted that Florida A&M had more than 30 transfers into the program, so he’s going to “have trouble sleeping” since he doesn’t know much about the Rattlers’ roster or what they’re bringing to the table.