Mack Brown addresses if he saw a common theme in North Carolina's losses

The North Carolina Tar Heels struggled to finish their football season off strong for the second season in a row. After starting the season 6-0, the Tar Heels would go 2-4 down the stretch to finish the regular season 8-4.

This trend could be worrisome to members of the program and North Carolina fans. And while that may be the case, head coach Mack Brown doesn’t believe there is a common theme in the Tar Heels struggles. Not only that but when addressing his team’s late-season struggles, the Tar Heels headman put the onus on himself more than anybody else.

“I don’t think there’s a common thread. I keep looking for ways to win more than eight games,” said Brown following North Carolina’s 39-20 loss to NC State to finish the season. “We got a chance to win nine again, which is pretty good around here, in the bowl game. But [we] had a great game against Duke two weeks ago. We played a good team tonight. They’re hard to beat over here, and they played better than we did.

“I did a poor job preparing this team to play, or we wouldn’t have looked that bad. And that’s me and a group of assistant coaches. [It] has nothing to do with the kids because they played their guts out the second half; that’s just it.”

A potential nine-win season is commendable, but it isn’t exactly what was expected out of North Carolina this season. The tar heels came into the 2023 campaign expecting to compete for the ACC crown and quite possibly punch their ticket to the College Football Playoff, and for good reason. Brown’s Tar Heels had one of the top two quarterbacks under center for them this season in Drake Maye. Maye is widely considered to be the second or top quarterback prospect, depending on who you ask, just behind USC’s Caleb Williams.

Unfortunately, despite having another strong season under center, the North Carolina signal-caller and crew stumbled down the stretch against opponents they were expected to beat. The Tar Heels’ first two losses of the season came back-to-back games against Virginia at home, 31-24, followed by a road loss against Georgia Tech, 46-42. The Tar Heels would win their next two games against Campbell and an overtime 47-45 thriller over Duke. But would proceed to lose their final two games of the season against Clemson and the aforementioned NC State loss.

The outcome of the 2023 season was not what Brown expected, but he is still proud of the effort that his players gave him throughout the season. In the end, the North Carolina head coach believes that if his team is to take the next step in their growth and development, it all starts with him. Brown has to be better at preparing his team to take the field, regardless of who they are playing.