Bill Belichick joins other NFL head coaches who have taken college gigs - ESPN

Bill Belichick has a trophy case full of titles from his time in the NFL. But the allure of a college championship evidently still calls to him.

Sources told ESPN's Adam Schefter, Pete Thamel and Chris Low on Wednesday that the legendary former New England Patriots boss would be making his return to coaching — almost a year after parting ways with the Patriots — as the coach of the North Carolina Tar Heels.

Belichick cuts a fascinating profile as a hire. Few — if any — in the industry have won like the six-time Super Bowl champ head coach has. But Belichick, 72, also has never held any official college coaching position in his nearly five-decade-long career.

Belichick's complete lack of college experience is an anomaly. But while he'd be starting his collegiate résumé next year, plenty more have returned to the college level after an NFL head coaching stint, though the results of such moves have been a decidedly mixed bag.

Here are some of the most notable head coaches to move from the pros to college over the past 20 years.

Matt Rhule, 2023, Nebraska

Rhule rose to fame thanks to his stints leading the Temple Owls and Baylor Bears. At Temple, he produced back-to-back 10-win seasons at a school that hadn't won double-digit games since 1979, and left Baylor after transforming a scandal-ridden program back into a New Year's Six participant.

His subsequent tenure leading the Carolina Panthers didn't go as swimmingly, where he was fired midway through his third season in charge after a lackluster first two campaigns. Soon afterward, he was tabbed by the Nebraska Cornhuskers to return to the college game, where he's currently 11-13 across two seasons. The Cornhuskers' Pinstripe Bowl appearance this December will be the team's