Mack Brown can’t save the college football season all by himself, and he knows that. But the Hall of Fame football coach recognizes he has a pretty significant platform, so he chose to use it.

Following North Carolina’s fifth practice of the preseason Tuesday morning, Brown held an hour-long zoom with local, regional and national media. And with a politician’s smoothness and confidence, a coach’s strength and command, and a teacher’s care, Brown fielded question after question about the nerve-racking world his sport finds itself courtesy of the COVID-19 pandemic that continues keeping society off kilter.

What’s fascinating, if you only listened to Brown on the subject, it wouldn’t be hard envisioning the ACC playing football this season. Not that he said the league should, just how he laid out how things are going within his program.

Brown was honest, optimistic, hit on every salient point about player safety, precautions, protocols, and regularly noted that players’ safety comes first.

But the unforgiving backdrop throughout Brown’s session was the very real possibility his sport will be the next COVID casualty, which later in the day claimed the Big Ten and Pac-12. So, he welcomed the opportunity to speak for his program, league and sport.

“Absolutely,” he said.

So, what did Brown say?

For starters, he used the words “safe” or “safety” 29 times, “mask” or “masks” 18 times, and “listen” or “listening” 11 times. There’s no mistaking where Brown’s priorities are: His guys and playing football.

“We haven’t had a positive test for over a month, so it feels like football, if you do what you’re supposed to, is not going to be a problem,” Brown said right out of the gate in his opening statement.

He went on.

“We feel very comfortable after five days of practice and a lot of walk throughs and workouts in the last month that we’re handling this well,” he said. “Our medical team has put us in a really good position and the guys are safe.”

Now, a quick reminder: The football team didn’t just arrive in Chapel Hill before the start of fall camp last week. The Tar Heels returned in four phases in June, and a few weeks later the school announced 37 of 429 people in the athletic department – athletes, coaches, other personnel – had tested positive for COVID-19. Football hasn’t had any since.

Brown said Tuesday he believes the players learned from that and have since been on point following every mandated protocol and rule.

And he went on.

“We’ve talked to the guys about, 'if any of you don’t feel good, just don’t practice, go tell the trainer, stay out,'” Brown said, echoing his constant message to the team since day one of their return two months ago. “We’ve got great medical help. I think (Clemson quarterback) Trevor Lawrence probably said it the best, but a lot of these young people have better doctors and trainers and availability to good food and nourishment here better than they would have at home.

“So, we’ve told the guys, don’t practice at all if you’re uncomfortable. Just stay out, stay with the trainers, stay with the doctors. When you feel comfortable, come back. If you practice 10 periods and you feel uncomfortable, you feel hot, you feel like you’re not breathing as well. Anything that you feel at all puts you in an uncomfortable spot, then don’t practice. Just go somewhere else and do something else.”

Brown wasn’t screaming from a rooftop or pounding his chest, but his message was quite clear Tuesday. And there’s more.

As much as getting out an accurate message is important to Brown, he also must deal with emotionally developing young college men who have worked their derrieres off since last season getting their bodies ready while also following every virus safety rule imaginable so football would happen this fall.

No envy here. That’s a task.

“We talk to them every time we have a team meeting about where we feel like the state of college football is,” Brown said. “It’s a roller coaster when you read and hear what you think is happening out there. So, I’ve told them, as soon as we know something, we will let them know immediately, but they need to prepare to play.”

Some dominoes have already fallen and more may come. At some point, the ACC must make a decision and probably soon. Maybe very soon.

And the ACC may not have much of a decision to make. Going at it alone isn’t likely, Brown said.

“I think if you see three or four of the leagues saying they don’t think it’s healthy, then I think people across the country would really be concerned that if enough people think it’s not safe then why would we do it?”

While Brown spoke for his team and sport, he didn’t say football must be played. He’s leaving that up to the medical people. But he did offer some truths to counter the misinformation so carelesly tossed around.

At this point, it’s all he could do, so Tuesday morning he did.