Mack Brown: ACC Championship Opportunities Normal for Clemson, Not North Carolina

North Carolina head coach Mack brown met with the media one final time ahead of the Tar Heels matchup with Clemson in the ACC Championship Game.

CHARLOTTE, N.C.- While Clemson has become accustomed to competing for championships under head coach Dabo Swinney, it's not something North Carolina has had the opportunity to do very often over the years. 

Saturday night's matchup against the Tigers will be just the Tar Heels' second appearance in the ACC Championship Game ever, as Mack Brown is attempting to win the program's first league title since 1980.

"Excited about playing in the ACC Championship game," Brown said. "It's normal for Clemson. It's not normal for us. We haven't played since 2012 in this game as the champion of the Coastal. So it's a tremendous honor for us and a very exciting time for our program.

"We also haven't won an ACC football championship since 1980, so it's been 42 years. I asked the guys the other day, how many of you were alive in 1980. They said, you were. I said, yeah, that's true. I was old at that time."

"We've only won five ACC football championships in our school history, so this is a historic time for us. We won nine games. We haven't done that but one time, in 2015, since I left in 1997. So we've been a very, very inconsistent football program, and this team has had a fun year. They've played hard. They've played well, and they've been fun to watch. They've given us effort every week."

Full Press Conference Transcript:

Q. I wonder if you could take us back to the year 2009. What prompted you to call Dabo and invite him to Texas, and what did you guys discuss, and anything you're regretting discussing right now with a match-up looming?

MACK BROWN: No, Coach Gene Stallings is a very dear friend of mine, and in fact, Sally and I started a Rise School of Austin because of Coach Stallings and his son Johnny who had Down's syndrome, and we played them in the Gator Bowl when I was at North Carolina, and we just loved Coach Stallings and loved Johnny, and Sally fell in love with Johnny.

When we got to Texas, Coach Stallings called and said there's a Rise School in Dallas, there's a Rise School in Austin, it's basically a preschool for young kids with special needs, and he said we've got one in Tuscaloosa, you need one in Austin. It's named after Sally and we have a school in Austin and it's very good and thriving.

Coach Stallings absolutely loves Dabo. That's his guy. And Woody McCorvey who basically runs the football program with Dabo is a dear friend of mine from high school days at Woodson High School in Pensacola, Florida, when I was at Southern Miss, so coaches know each other. So I didn't call Dabo when he got the job, he called me, and I think he called about five other people and they all said no, and I said, sure, come on.

Because of me caring about Coach Stallings, I think Coach Stallings even said he called and said, will you help him out, and Woody McCorvey called and said, come on, help Dabo out, and we just had a good time.

We ran our programs so much alike, and it's not that he came to me and asked me what we did; it's what he's developed into. But we share so many things.

A lot of the recruits that come to both places say the programs are -- we hear the same things when we go to each one.

Very, very proud for Dabo and all that he's accomplished. He's kind of at the point now where I was at Texas. You win so much that if you ever lose people are shocked, and I can't believe it and the world is coming to an end. You're 10-2. A lot of people would like to have Dabo's problems. But he handles it and he handles it right, and he's just done a great job.

Q. Kind of piggy-backing off of that, is there anything when you came back to Chapel Hill in 2019 that you instead took from what Dabo is currently doing at Clemson that you wanted to implement in your --

MACK BROWN: Yes, I took from Dabo that you need to recruit really, really good players, the best ones in the country, and then turn them loose, because he's done that.

But no, I've talked to Dabo all the time. We never lost contact with each other even when I got out of coaching. Like I said, he was one of the go-to guys with me when I would ask about his thoughts in college football and where we were going with these things, and he was so transparent, he would share anything with me, and still will. I can honestly call him and talk to him Friday night and we could have a good conversation without crossing the line to get into what's going to happen in the game.

Q. I asked Coach Swinney what was his silent X factor to win tomorrow. I ask the same: Who is your silent X factor for a win tomorrow?

MACK BROWN: Who did he say?

Q. Mafah.

MACK BROWN: Well, he's real good, so I can see that. Somebody said, are you worried about Shipley. I said, when they take him out they've got a 230-pound back they're going to put in, and you look at what the guy has done. Notre Dame pounded us with a big back, so I know that's going to be part of what Clemson is looking at tomorrow is just can we stop the run.

When I look at it, who would be our X guy? I think our X guy is Drake Maye. Drake has to play well for us to have a chance to win, and probably within that group, then you'd say Antoine Green because everybody knows Josh Downs and Antoine has been a great player. He's missed five games because of injury, but when he's been out there, he's really helped us.

Q. You've coached in the Rose Bowl, Cotton Bowl Games, National Championship games. What is it like to coach now in an ACC Championship game?

MACK BROWN: It's the same. You look at these young people and they want to win so badly. I just love college football players. We've got finals this week. I was talking to Drake on Monday, and he said, yeah, Coach, I've got five finals this week or five papers I've got to write. So they're amazing how hard they work. Most people are on break or doing their finals and these guys are practicing in the morning, lifting weights in the afternoon and still taking their finals.

I really think to have a chance to do something that hasn't been done in 42 years is really special. At Texas we hadn't won a National Championship in 35 years, and that was really, really special.

But you just want your guys to be successful. You want your guys to be happy. What I've told them is everybody is picking Clemson to win. Everybody knows Clemson has got the best team in the ACC and they've had that just about every year.

But I want your best. I want you to give me everything you've got for 60 minutes because you're going to remember this game for the rest of your life, and that's all I can ask you to do.

Q. Wondering when you recruited Drake from here in Charlotte, what about his makeup and mentality led you to believe he could bring a team to a championship game and play on this stage? Did you think then that he could do so this early?

MACK BROWN: Yeah, he's got really good genes. His dad was a graduate assistant for me. I didn't get to coach him because I came the year after he got through players, and Mark led the ACC in passing and then hurt his shoulder or he would have had an NFL career and then you look at the brother goes to win a National Championship in baseball, brother who goes and wins a National Championship in basketball, other brother is on the Carolina basketball team. They are a family of champions. That's who they are. They're smart. They've got great faith. They compete at a very high level. They're very confident. They're very humble.

When I called him and said congratulations on being the Player of the Year in the ACC, he started the ol', well, you know, Coach, it's about all the other players and all that, and I said Drake, just say thank you, man. You've played great.

I used to do that. We'd win 13 games and somebody would come up and I'd say we didn't play as good, and Sally would say, why don't you shut up, don't try to talk them out of it, just say thank you. So that's what we've got Drake doing.

I'm surprised we're here this fast. I think our best team will be next year because just about everybody is coming back. We'll lose a few key guys.

But sitting there in preseason, I mean, we're in a quarterback battle in the spring and Jacolby Criswell is really good and we're in a quarterback battle in the fall and then you have to make a decision who you're going to go with.

You can see how they play in practice. You never know how that's going to transition to the game, and you could tell in the first game he's really special, and I think he'll be a first-round draft choice after next year.

Q. Championship games typically feature teams who have been winning on their way to the game and both teams are coming off of losses. How unique do you think this opportunity is for both teams and the intensity that it could have for this game in particular as both teams are trying to bounce back to win a championship?

MACK BROWN: Yeah, college football has gotten crazy. You don't ever know who's going to win anymore.

It's interesting, I've always really tried to look at emotion and confidence and energy for college football. A lot of times people lose their rival game right before a championship game because they're so excited about what's next, and we haven't played as well on offense since we clinched the coastal at Wake Forest. They're probably looking toward this.

You try and you talk to them about it and you tell them but it's still out there. I remember Steve Spurrier couldn't beat Coach Bowden, and he always said I'm not as worried about the Florida State game as I am the SEC Championship game, and I always thought that was really unique because the people in your state want you to beat your rival. So it gets a little confusing in there, and you've got to beat everybody in order to make everybody happy.

I think that Clemson and North Carolina for an ACC Championship game would be played at such a high level anyway, I don't think last week's games will have anything to do with tomorrow night.

Q. You mentioned a little bit about you're a little farther ahead than you thought. I remember in 2020 you said you were farther ahead than you expected. Are you kind of on track to where the trajectory is in terms of what you thought four years ago?

MACK BROWN: Yeah, I think you'd have to say we're ahead of the game since we hadn't played but for one championship in 42 years, and we've gone to an Orange Bowl, which we hadn't ever done. We're doing things that have never been done at Carolina in football. We've got nine wins for only the second time since 1997.

I think in the second year with a team that was 5-18 before we got there in the previous two years, to go to an Orange Bowl was absolutely unbelievable.

Then you lose great players. You don't lose good players for you. Then last year we just didn't coach as well and we didn't play as well so we took a step back. But six wins has been about what the average has been at Carolina, even though when you're expecting 13, six isn't enough.

Then you come back this year and people thought we'd be average and struggle, and we're 9-1 at one point and here we are at nine wins. To make everybody happy you've got to win all the games. The second thing to make everybody happy, you've got to win in November and December, and we didn't do that at the end of November.

You've got some people that are upset with nine wins and going to play for a championship. I can't worry about those folks. I've got to worry about our team, and I'm proud of them and proud of what they've done.

But I'm really, really proud -- if you'd have asked me and Bubba Cunningham four years ago, are you going to be playing Clemson with a freshman quarterback in the ACC Championship game in four years, we would have both taken it.

Q. You mentioned recruiting earlier and Clemson has kind of been the standard of recruiting in the ACC. How big would a win here in the ACC Championship game be for recruiting?

MACK BROWN: Well, it would be big for recruiting but more for those kids in the program. I said when you're 45 years old they're going to ask you about your teams, and you're going to talk about this game. It's going to be a game that people will remember. This is a game where either you fizzle out and you don't play well or you become a hero. That's what I've told them.

The championship games -- there's only 10 Power Fives playing this weekend. That's it. Out of 131. So you are really, really special to still be playing. You're going to play against the Big Ten Championship game; everybody that watches college football is either going to watch you and Clemson or they're going to watch Purdue and Michigan. So let's have them watching you, man. Let's have them turn you on and you remember this for the rest of your life. This should be fun.

Not many people get to play in a championship. Half of them don't win it. Only half of those get to win it.

It changed my life when we won a National Championship. When we lost a National Championship in 2010 to Alabama, all it is then is you didn't win it. Nobody cares if you were second or 50th. They don't care. Our society is about winning, it's about championships, and that's all tomorrow night will be about.

Q. Over the last year we've heard lots of stories and anecdotes about players being offered NIL deals to transfer other places. How worried or concerned are you that some schools may come after Drake this off-season?

MACK BROWN: One of the real issues we've got in college football, I feel, is people that are tampering with guys on your team and paying them money to leave. It's an issue that needs to get stopped.

Before you could call it tampering. Now you've got agents, you've got third parties, you've got high school coaches. I've just told our players if somebody is calling you and trying to get you to go, let me know. Let me know who they are. I sat down and did lunch with one of our starters the other day, and I said, are you getting calls? He said, Coach, I've got 15 places I can go. He said, I'm not going anywhere. I said, Are they offering you money? He said, Yes, 100 percent.

I don't think Drake will go anywhere because he's a Carolina family. Right now you look at our recruiting, it's not as high as it has been in the past. It's because every player that we've got that's coming is coming because he wants to come to the University of North Carolina, he wants to come for academics, and he's coming for the right reasons.

Sadly enough we've probably lost five great players that aren't going to come that would have normally come if NIL hadn't been an issue. But that's just the world we live in. There are already 2,000 young people in the transfer portal. Next week there will probably be 6,000 more because right now grad transfers and FCS guys can get in and we're getting calls from all over the country.

I told our guys, we'll have some leave on Monday and here we are playing in a championship game on Saturday, we won't get to see them on Sunday and on Monday they can enter the portal. I've told our guys if you want to leave, let us know and we'll try to help you.

I've also told them which is a little different. I wouldn't have thought this five years ago. If they want to leave and they're leaving for the right reasons and they're practicing really hard to help us win this game, I don't mind if they go in the portal and stay for the bowl game because they're leaving because they want more playing time, and if they're doing everything right, I got it. You helped us get to this situation, I'd like for you to be able to finish it.

Q. Drake Maye has led six come-from-behind game-winning drives, almost has eight. But it almost seems like he's more comfortable in those situations when he's going fast, doesn't have to think, just plays. Is that fair to say, and how does he compare -- I know you've coached some great quarterbacks like Vince Young. How rare is that attribute?

MACK BROWN: Well, one of the sad things is we've been behind a lot, so we've tested him with that come-from-behind ability because that seems to be who we are.

But he's very confident. He's very even-keel. He doesn't get up or down very much at all, which is the trait of a great player.

The comeback against Duke, he took a two-minute drive -- 1:39 drive right before the half and scored, and then with 2:04 left goes down and scores with 16 seconds to beat Duke.

Again, never changed his personality. He did the same just about every game that we've won.

But I think it's just because of his confidence more than anything else. He doesn't look at the scoreboard.

I have a really bad trait that I'm too hard on me, and if we lose, I beat myself up and I wonder what we should have done different and I can't sleep and it takes me three or four days to even get back to where I can function, and he really beats himself up too much because with all the success he's had, he would talk to you about the losses and the four passes he's thrown that are interceptions more than he would the great plays that he's made.

I think he's a guy that can win a championship, whether it's tomorrow night or next year. He's a guy that is confident enough and has enough ability, and he's got the accuracy of Colt McCoy, which was in the 70s when we were playing at Texas, and he's got the confidence of both he and Vince Young. Vince ran better than anybody. But Drake runs pretty good.

We're just so fortunate to have him.

Q. You've been coaching for a long time. Just going back to last year, a lot of your struggles came on the road. This year you guys are road warriors and a lot of your losses or all your losses came at home. Do you chalk that up as this is a year-to-year thing with different teams, and knowing what you know, is it good that this is a neutral site game?

MACK BROWN: Well, I think so. We lost the last two at home, and we had great crowds and they were very supportive.

I think the last year, for whatever reason, we kind of missed it. We went from two wins -- like I said, five wins and 18 losses in the two years before we got there to winning a bowl game the first year. So that was fun and easy, and it was all new.

Second year, we play in the Orange Bowl. Never done that. So you would think the natural progression in a program would be the third year you've got a lot of guys back, even though you lose four great players, that you're just going to do that, and I think we missed it.

We went back this year like we had just gotten there and we started over. Every little thing we started over. We didn't take anything for granted, so the leadership has been better. The attention to detail has been better. Teaching them how much harder it is to win on the road is better.

This game is a road game, but it's a neutral site game, so it's a little bit different than being at Death Valley, which we go to Death Valley next year to play. We play at Clemson next year.

But I do think that they've been very, very proud that they've been able to win on the road in very fun places to play. We were the biggest game at Duke this year; we were the biggest game other than Clemson at Wake this year; we were the biggest game ever at Appalachian State. So you start looking at those games, and all of them are fun. We had a great crowd at Miami. I think there was 45,000 when we played there.

It's just been fun to watch them feel better about themselves because all the narrative is the negative now in college football or college sports and probably in life.

Last year when we won all the games, we didn't get any credit for beating a top-10 Wake team, it was all about the losses you had. That's just kind of where we are in society.

Q. On the transfer portal, you said you can't talk to kids on Sunday and then Monday it happens. Can you talk us through the conversations you had, then what the process is for transfers Sunday and whatever happens on Monday?

MACK BROWN: I'm sorry, we just won't be around because we're -- after the game it's going to be so late that some guys will go home with their parents, some guys live in Charlotte and they'll stay here, some will spend the night at the hotel and get on the bus and go back to Chapel Hill the next day, so our coaches have some meetings set up on Sunday with some guys, but we will be talking to them -- some will come in on Monday. We've said don't do this by yourself. We can get you in the transfer portal. Compliance is going to know when you go in anyway, so you can't slip by and not tell anybody.

So just tell people. Our coaches, this game is really important to us, so our coaches have been hesitant to say, hey Ross, are you leaving, man? I know you've got to play Saturday night, but are you out of here? Are you going to play or are you going to stay? So we'll have some guys playing tomorrow night that will probably be leaving on Monday, and that discussion will either come Sunday or Monday morning, and then the other thing that's tough for us, you can go out recruiting tonight basically for the first time today, so our coaches will be recruiting Sunday, they'll be recruiting Monday, I'm going out Monday afternoon. So trying to see all these guys, trying to recruit the guys that are going into the portal on Monday or the guys that are already in from FCS and grad transfers this week and trying to get on the road next week and see your commitments or some guys that are still out there that you may want to offer. It's a handful now. It's more than any college coaches have ever had to deal with before.