CHAPEL HILL – Perhaps one of the biggest misnomers when it comes to success on the football field for college programs is that it is strictly about the Jimmys and the Joes.

They are vital, of course, that is why coaching staffs put so much of their time and energy onto the recruiting trail and why bells and whistles inside a program’s facilities are constantly being upgraded. Keeping up with the Joneses is a real thing in recruiting.

But there is so much more from skills development to scheming, teaching, and sheer talent. In addition, personal accountability is an attribute and asset within a program, especially winning ones. It leads to team cohesion, helps build a positive culture, trust, and allows coaches to focus on things that lead to victories instead of laying awake at night worrying about what some wide receiver or linebacker is doing.

North Carolina’s summer workouts are a crucial part of the Tar Heels’ near-year long approach to a fall season. Quietly nestled in between the spring football game and the start of fall camp in August, the summer workouts are a series of player-led practices and team competitions.

Literally, it tabs everything the players do. So, with UNC just a few weeks from the start of fall camp, which kicks off Aug. 5, the Tar Heels are closing in on the conclusion of a fun and effective use of the year’s hottest months.

“Our summer workouts are going really, really well,” UNC Coach Mack Brown recently said during his July press conference updating how things are going in the program. “The guys are working harder, they understand we’re trying to reach another level.”

The Tar Heels went 7-6 in Brown’s first season back at Carolina, capping it by routing Temple to win the Military Bowl. Last season, UNC finished at 8-4, but it demolished Miami on the road in December and took Texas A&M to the wire in the Orange Bowl, the program’s first major bowl in 71 years.

Expectations are even greater as the 2021 campaign nears, so hiccups like what happened at Florida State last October and the wilting late losses to Notre Dame and the Aggies have been a point of emphasis throughout the offseason. Brown come out of retirement just because coaching is fun and he needed the cash, he came back to win, and to perhaps finish what he started in the 1990s.

Before taking the Texas job following the 1997 campaign, Brown’s last two UNC teams finished ranked in the Top 10 losing just three times while winning 21 games. They were on the cusp of playing for a national championship in 1997 but fell short. Brown wants the program to take that next step.

Why else would he buy a house a mile from the Kenan Football Center and renovate so it’s less than a mile from his office thus making it allowable that recruits visit him in his home? Only a coach who means business would do that, and Brown is clearly intent on taking UNC to the next level.

“We had a good year last year, (but) we’re trying to be great,” he said. “And to do that, everybody’s got to improve by one percent. Everybody’s got to step up: Do your job, get better, help your team in any way that you possibly can.”

So, a part of that process is what happens in June and July, the months when nobody is paying attention. Strength and conditioning coach Brian Hess runs the show during the summer and devised a competition in which the older players draft teammates to field a widespread competition that hits on nearly every aspect of their lives, at least all that are relevant to football.

“Everything they do from attending class to a tutoring session to being on time to meetings to winning in the performance things that we’ve got in the weight room to what you eat and showing up for every meal,” Brown said, explaining elements of the competition. “All of that counts as points for your team or points that are taken away. And then there’s a winning team at the end of the summer.”

This is serious business, too. The players approach it as they do game week when NC State or Miami are up next. They go for the gusto.

“It’s fun to watch those guys work,” Brown said.

An example of the success Hess has had with these competitions is reflected by the team's success in the classroom. There is no greater measure of self-discipline than academic achievement, or otherwise, and the Tar Heels are getting it done.

The program’s most recent APR rating was 997, which is 23 points higher than any time previously for the football team. Brown also said over the last six semesters, the program’s GPA is 3.167.

School work is year-long, but it reflects the no-bull approach by the team to their summer workouts and disciplines.

“(I’m) really proud of the way the guys have worked, even through COVID, with all the unusual things that they had to do to go virtual, and they’ve still done a great job,” Brown said.

UNC will start the season favored to win the ACC Coastal Division and is regarded as a dark horse to make the College Football Playoff while junior quarterback Sam Howell is one of the leading contenders for the Heisman Trophy. This is a far cry from five wins over the final two seasons of the previous regime.

Brown came back to do stuff like this and more, and when fans see the Tar Heels excel during the fall, they should understand the summer workouts, competitons, and chemistry building are very much a part of that success.