Bill Belichick may well be the greatest professional football coach in this country's history, but college football is a lot different from the NFL. That was evident in 2025 when North Carolina went 4-8 in Belichick's first season as a college head coach, not to mention some embarrassing off-field issues. The legendary coach will now lead his Tar Heels in the first game of the FBS season against TCU in Dublin, Ireland at Noon ET on Saturday.
Bet on college football at DraftKings, where new users get $200 when they spend $5+: The game will be played at Aviva Stadium, home of the Irish national rugby and soccer teams. Weather is always a concern in Ireland, and Saturday afternoon there's an 80% chance of showers with low winds and highs near 65 degrees. At DraftKings, TCU at -8.5 is taking 79% of the handle and wagers, while the total of 47.5 is taking split action.
If you're interested in college football betting and want to try it on the best sports betting apps, you can check out the SportsLine Projection Model for picks on games from both the simulations and our experts. We have a strong play here for those who want to get into parlay betting as the 2026 college football season kicks off. DraftKings price: -151 (subject to change) It's the fourth straight season the FBS season kicks off in Ireland with Iowa State beating Kansas State 24-21 last year.
Overall, five of the past six games played in the country have been decided by three points or fewer. The underdog has won three of the past four outright. Frankly, this year isn't going that much better for Belichick, at least off the field -- he is the +600 third-favorite to be the first power conference coach fired after Florida State's Mike Norvell (+300) and Maryland's Mike Locksley (+500).
CBS Sports does an annual "Hot Seat" ranking entering the college football season and gives Belichick a grade of 4.1 on a scale of 1-5, with one meaning essentially untouchable and five meaning about to be fired. While we haven't heard much from his girlfriend Jordon Hudson this year, thankfully, Belichick's right-hand man in general manager Michael Lombardi was placed on leave after a human resources complaint and is still away from the team. Lombardi was the guy who basically built the roster.
There's really nowhere go but up as the Heels got worse as the 2025 season went on, losing their final three games by an average of 15.3 points. Overall, Belichick suffered the most losses by at least 20 points (four) of his entire head coaching career. He will have a new starting quarterback in Wisconsin transfer Billy Edwards Jr. as he beat out Texas A&M transfer Miles O'Neill.
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