Mack Brown, UNC using NCAA Tournament upsets as way to motivate players

Many watch the NCAA Tournament for the memorable upsets, and Mack Brown is no different. Except he’s using each shocking victory to teach lessons that inspire his North Carolina Tar Heels squad.

Brown believes an upset can be explained by a lack of preparation from the more talented team, and it’s happened to his Tar Heels squad over his coaching tenure. As spring practices roar on, Brown is keeping his players’ focus in check, with an assist to March Madness to do so.

“We’re happy with the seven practices,” started Brown. “They practiced again well this morning. Our theme has been we’ve been good, now it’s time to go be great. To do that, you can’t have a bad day. You’ve got to be ready to practice every day. You’ve got to be ready to play every day. Every day’s like game-day. As we said earlier, it’s evident that some people weren’t as ready to play in the (NCAA) Tournament as they needed to be. It’s a great message for all of us.

“Our thought of the day was from Mike Tomlin this morning, that you can’t be comfortable. You can never get comfortable in sports, in life, but especially in sports, because somebody will take your place. So we’ve got to take advantage of every day.”

Evidently, Brown believes whole-heartedly in his North Carolina team’s talent, hoping they can realize it and not slip up at inopportune moments, like they’ve done in the past. Brown wants to get North Carolina to the College Football Playoff, and that won’t happen if they’re not on their game each time out.

Moreover, Brown’s comments echo his earlier words from last week, where he spoke about changing the narrative around his Tar Heels squad.

“We’ve got to change that narrative. We’ve got to be focused and be ready to go, and have an edge every day and every meeting, and every practice. Every walk through, to be able to get your mindset, that’s that is the way that you’re going to play every Saturday, regardless of who you play or what somebody thinks that game is going to be, you’re supposed to beat this team, 21 points. It doesn’t matter.

“Look at the Tournament. Look at the Tournament. It’s who plays the best on that day. It sounds like a cliche, but it’s facts.”

Over his four seasons since his return to North Carolina, Brown has been a shot in the arm to a program that had won five games in the two seasons prior to his arrival. During his first season in 2019, the Tar Heels went 7-6, sold out every home game, and won the Military Bowl. Then, they followed that with an 8-4 season in 2020 and a trip to the Orange Bowl, the school’s first major bowl in 70 years.

Since, it’s been more of the same success for Mack Brown, but he’s not looking to hit a wall, he wants to win championships. He believes that’s possible at North Carolina, and he’ll do everything he can to make it happen.