On Wednesday, a report from The Athletic revealed that head coach Bill Belichick’s girlfriend was “instrumental” in cancelling a previously planned HBO “Hard Knocks” series focused on the Tar Heels. The story states that Belichick was initially on board with the project, but production was halted when he never gave it final approval. It still cost North Carolina $200,000 in facilities fees.
Why was UNC ‘Hard Knocks’ canceled?
It is unclear exactly why UNC “Hard Knocks” was cancelled, but the production certainly needed Belichick’s final approval as the head coach of the program, which he never provided.
UNC’s general manager, Michael Lombardi, appeared on the “Pat McAfee Show” in March and weighed in on the matter, claiming the series was not going to align with how the football program wants to be portrayed.
“It would’ve been great,” Lombardi said. “The problem was…the story that we want to tell is about how we’re rebuilding this program…How we’re going to restore Tar Heel football, and make this stadium come alive on Saturday afternoons, like a lot of the other schools in the ACC… And when [the series] stops after the first game [against TCU] like ‘Hard Knocks’ does, it doesn’t really do us any good to tell that story. And that really was the concern that we all had here in the building
