When Bill Belichick left the NFL for North Carolina, it felt as though the final page had been turned on one of the greatest coaching careers the league had ever seen. After six Super Bowl titles and decades spent building a dynasty with the New England Patriots and Tom Brady, his NFL chapter appeared closed.

But in football, few doors stay shut forever.

What Stands Between Bill Belichick and an NFL Return

On Wednesday, ESPN insider Adam Schefter was asked on New England radio station WEEI whether any NFL team would want Belichick, who is now in his second season with the Tar Heels, as its head coach next season.

The question came four days after the Tar Heels’ 24-20 win at Duke on October 17, Belichick’s first win over the Blue Devils. UNC watched a 17-0 lead turn into a 20-17 deficit with 4:39 left. Then Jaylen McGill’s 24-yard touchdown run with 1:53 to go put them back in front, and Kenton Dopson III’s interception in the final seconds sealed it.

UNC is 2-1 in ACC play at the midpoint of its 12-game regular season.

Belichick’s NFL résumé is a familiar one, with 24 seasons leading the Patriots, six Super Bowl titles and 31 postseason wins, the most by any head coach in NFL history.

Schefter was blunt about the nearly three-year gap since Belichick left New England: “I’ve always thought that teams should be interested,” he said. “The problem is teams haven’t been interested.” For a hire to happen, he said, “the NFL would have to change its stance.”

“So we can continue to wish it to happen, but it hasn’t happened in the last years. That doesn’t mean that candidates can’t all of a sudden get hired.”

Schefter took a measured stance on the possibility, suggesting that a return cannot be ruled out even if teams have shown little interest in recent years. “When they give them a no and they’re not interested, that’s not a permanent no, but Bill gets another year older every year, and he’s been out of the league another year,” the insider noted.

Belichick and the Patriots parted ways in January 2024, and the Atlanta Falcons interviewed him twice during their 2024 coaching search before hiring Raheem Morris. UNC announced his hiring that December.

A team hiring him for 2027 would be bringing back a coach who had spent three NFL seasons out of the league, the latter two as North Carolina’s head coach.

So what would it take? Schefter allowed that “of course it could happen,” then set a high bar: “There would have to be a team that would show more interest than any team has in the last couple of years for that to happen.”

The hosts had specifically asked about Belichick potentially replacing Brian Schottenheimer at the Dallas Cowboys, whose defense currently ranks last in PFN’s Defense Impact Score with a 60.9 grade through six weeks.

But Schefter’s answer was more about the league’s appetite than about any specific club’s plans. Even last November, with UNC 4-7 late in the 2025 season, Schefter talked about the rumors tying Belichick to an NFL return: “I think it’s a lot of noise more than it is anything else.” He added, “I don’t really like some of these proclamations.”

Belichick stayed in Chapel Hill. If a team does make the move this time, he would return with 333 NFL head-coaching wins, including the playoffs. That leaves him 14 wins from tying Don Shula’s record of 347 and 15 from passing it.