Paul Finebaum: North Carolina's loss to Virginia is the embodiment of Mack Brown

The hype got to No. 10 North Carolina as the Tar Heels suffered their first loss of the season on Saturday at the hands of a Virginia team that had just one win coming into the weekend. Still, in the end, Paul Finebaum thought this might have been coming down the pipe for UNC.

Finebaum spoke about North Carolina’s 31-27 home loss to the Cavaliers on ‘The Matt Barrie Show’ on Sunday. He reminded him that he had still remained cautious about the Tar Heels to this point because, at some point or another, this is the trip up that always comes with teams that are led by Mack Brown.

“I was on the air the other day with Jeff Saturday,” explained Finebaum. “We were doing our top-four and he said, ‘Hey! What about North Carolina?’. And I said, ‘What about North Carolina?'”

“That is North Carolina. Sadly, it has been the embodiment of Mack Brown at North Carolina,” Finebaum said. “He has done a phenomenal job but he just always has that game. That’s really too bad because that program probably deserved better.”

After reaching 6-0, North Carolina had finally entered the conversation as a national contender. They had been a part of the ACC picture from the beginning, and remain in that position, but talks about playoff hopes had started to pick up around Chapel Hill.

However, that dream took a serious blow with the loss to the Cavaliers. They put themselves behind early and then allowed Virginia to overcome a 10-point deficit in the second half to take it by four inside Kenan Stadium.

Now, over his 15 seasons with the Tar Heels, Brown has 11 losses as a ranked team against an unranked opponent. Of those 11 losses, seven have come since his return to the job in 2019.

After falling seven spots in the AP Poll, North Carolina has work to do to seriously reenter the significant portion of the postseason picture. With Brown’s history, though, Finebaum isn’t sure they’ll ever rejoin it after putting up a clunker this weekend.

Brown on getting Tez Walker eligible: ‘I sat there and cried’

Mack Brown couldn’t help but get emotional when he received word that Tez Walker was granted eligibility.

Walker sat out the first four games of action after the NCAA declared him ineligible due to transferring multiple times in his career. However, after previously denying the Tar Heels’ appeal of that decision, the NCAA reversed course and granted him eligibility in light of “new information.” It was a long time coming for the Kent State transfer who came to Chapel Hill to be closer to his family and a grandmother that is battling illness and had never seen him play in college.

Walker made his debut in the powder blue in front of several members of his family against Syracuse. Brown described the emotions of the days leading up to that game.

“I sat there and cried,” Brown said. “What a dream for that kid. I get emotional talking about it here. He has 12 people from his family on the field after the game taking pictures. That was a life’s dream for that kid.”