North Carolina, TCU moving 2026 season opener to Ireland

North Carolina and TCU have added a wrinkle to their 2026 season-opening showdown. Tar Heels director of athletics Bubba Cunningham announced that the game will be played in Ireland, per Adam Smith of Inside Carolina.

The showdown had been scheduled for Sept. 5, 2026 on TCU’s home field. It’s slated to follow the Horned Frogs visiting Chapel Hill to open the 2025 season. That game will also serve as the debut of Bill Belichick for the Tar Heels.

Now, North Carolina and TCU will play in Dublin, instead of the Horned Frogs facing the Tar Heels on their home turf. However, they’ll be compensated well for moving the game to Dublin: “The Tar Heels have negotiated compensation for TCU, sources confirmed, as a means of recouping the revenue that’s generated by a home football game,” Smith added.

All told, that’s an exciting matchup that football fans in Ireland can get hyped over. Iowa State and Kansas State will be playing in the famed matchup in 2025, but the Tar Heels and the Horned Frogs will make for an interesting showdown in 2026, for sure.

Before their trip to Dublin though, FanDuel Sportsbook has revealed the early odds for the clash between TCU and North Carolina in 2025. At the moment, the Tar Heels are 2.5-point favorites over the Horned Frogs in Chapel Hill.

UNC is also listed as a -125 favorite on the money-line, while TCU is +104. As you can tell, this game looks close on paper, at least a couple of months out. The total was set at 57.5 points.

More on North Carolina, TCU

Moreover, NFL rumors swirled around Bill Belichick amid his first offseason as North Carolina head coach, but he’s focused on building a scouting staff. Similar to Nick Saban during this time at Alabama. The two are very familiar with each other, having worked together with the Cleveland Browns.

“I appreciate Coach Saban’s comments about the evaluations that we did in Cleveland,” Belichick said earlier this year, via ESPN’s College GameDay. “I think I learned a lot more from him than he did from me.

“He’s a great evaluator. And then, I watched him at Alabama put together essentially his scouting and evaluation staff. Now, I’m copying a lot of things that I watched him do there and learned from the system that he installed there.”

“We’re on top of each guy – evaluating the players that we think will be coming in, but also some declare that maybe we didn’t expect or you start to hear players that are rumored to come in. We’re digging through all those guys. We have a lot to offer here at Carolina, both academically with this institution and the football program, and what we have to offer.”

Meanwhile, Sonny Dykes looks to improve TCU in Year 4. He started great, getting to the national championship game before dipping to 5-7 the following season. But after a 9-4 campaign, it seems like TCU, like North Carolina, is on an upward trajectory.

— On3’s Nick Kosko contributed to this article.