The North Carolina Tar Heels' quarterback competition has received an update.
The North Carolina Tar Heels definitely have questions surrounding the quarterback position heading into 2026.
North Carolina lost Gio Lopez to the transfer portal, but it added three transfer quarterbacks of its own in Billy Edwards, Miles O'Neill and Taron Dickens.
Not only that, but the Tar Heels have four-star freshman Travis Burgess waiting in the wings, as well.
So what exactly is Bill Belichick going to do about the position?
Well, during a recent episode of the Cover 3 Podcast, Chip Patterson of CBS Sports provided an update on the competition, and it appears that Edwards is in the lead.
"The little bits of viewing from the first practice, I think I saw Billy Edwards throwing with Miles O’Neill and Travis Burgess looking on," Patterson said.
Edwards is now on his fourth team. He began his career at Wake Forest in 2021, but didn't play at all before transferring to Maryland the following year.
Billy Edwards. Credit: Mark Hoffman / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images.The 23-year-old eventually became a full-time starter for the Terrapins in 2024, throwing for 2,881 yards, 15 touchdowns and nine interceptions. He then transferred to Wisconsin for 2025, but threw all of 16 passes due to a knee injury.
Edwards is now looking for a fresh start in Chapel Hill during his final year of eligibility.
"I was not there, so I can’t speak to it personally. But the way that it seems, I would guess Billy Edwards is going to be the steady hand," Patterson added. "But there’ll be plenty of competition, and we’ll see what ends up happening when the full room gets there in June. Because they don’t even have all their new additions yet."
The general consensus has been all along that Edwards will end up being the starter, but both O'Neill and Dickens — the latter of whom set an NCAA record with 46 straight completions in a game for Western Carolina last season — were intriguing pickups.
North Carolina is just hoping that its circumstances under center yield better results than last year, when Lopez struggled to get anything going throughout the campaign.
The Tar Heels went just 4-8 during Belichick's inaugural season in 2025.
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