CHAPEL HILL – Whether or not North Carolina will name a starting quarterback before it hosts Florida A&M on August 27 remains to be seen, but the door appears to be opening that will indeed happen.

Redshirt sophomore Jacolby Criswell and redshirt freshman Drake Maye have battled each other for the job since the final second ticked off the clock at the Duke’s Mayo Bowl in Charlotte last December. Sam Howell took his final snap behind center that day, and is now off to the NFL.

The UNC staff hasn’t budged much on whatever direction they could be leaning, if they are actually leaning – either Criswell or Maye – and haven’t through the first seven practices of fall camp.

But offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach Phil Longo said Friday it’s possible a decision is made before Carolina enters its first game week. He and UNC Coach Mack Brown understand the benefit of naming a starter and discuss it daily.

“I think he wants our team to know, too,” Longo said following practice Friday morning, Carolina’s seventh of fall camp. “We want to have some continuity with who that guy is. I know the team’s gonna rally around either one of them, and I know the other one is going to be prepared and ready to go when he gets his number called.

“That’s the plan right now, and we may wind up knowing before that, we may not know until then. We’ll see how it goes. I’m enjoying this competition as much as y’all are.”

So far, Criswell and Maye split reps with the blue (first team) and white (second team) units. They are very different players, but are tasked with the same mission in camp, as they were in the winter, spring practice, and the player-led practices in the summer. The difference is now they are truly competing.

Each throw is charted for accuracy and fundamentals, and Longo is quite pleased both players have made strides in the areas that needed refining following the spring.

“I think both Jacolby and Drake had great springs, so the goal was to clean up some of the technique issues that we had in the spring,” he said. “They had stuff that they wanted to work on and we expected to see that stuff cleaner, sharper, a lot better than it was in the spring, and they both did that.

“So, we came in pretty clean fundamentally, and that gives us an opportunity now to try to play the game faster with regards to decision making and then when we needed to do some of the athletic things, like run the football or execute the screens. So, right now I think we’re very, very happy with where Jacolby and Drake are.”

Criswell, who is 6-foot-1 and 225 pounds, has been at UNC for a year longer than Maye, having enrolled in January 2020. Maye enrolled 12 months later. Criswell has played more, too. He is 16-for-25 passing with 195 yards, a touchdown and an interception, and has run the ball 16 times for 94 yards and a score, all in 94 game snaps.

Maye, who is almost 6-foot-5 and weighs 220 pounds, is 7-for-10 passing with 89 yards, and a touchdown, while he has run the ball six times for 62 yards. Maye has played 41 snaps.

Regardless of when the staff makes a decision on who will start versus the Rattlers, or has flat out won the job, each day they compete sharpens their edges. Perhaps some of that is by design, too, and not simply a byproduct of the competition.

Criswell hasn’t obviously played much in nearly three years, and since Maye lost his senior season in high school because he enrolled early, and North Carolina high schools played a spring season that year due to COVID, he also has barely played in nearly three years.

“That’s exactly it,” Longo said, agreeing with the premise the competition is sharpening both players. “The daily grind and the consistency from play to play; they both did really well in the (Wofford) game where they split halves last year, executed well, had a few things to clean up, and played a relatively clean game with good decisions. So, we’d like to see that translate to their play this year.

“And I think overall, they have a very, very good grasp of the system, and the key in the camp here now, is to take what we know on the board and execute it at game speed out here. I’m happy with where we are. We’ve got some work to do, but the progress after seven, eight days, is where we’d like it to be.”

Someone has to take the first snap sometime after 8 PM three weeks from Saturday, but it’s possible that mystery could end much sooner.