UNC Football: Jay Bateman officially named Tar Heels Defensive Coordinator
By Alec Lasley
The Tar Heels have officially announced the hiring of Jay Bateman to take over the North Carolina defense alongside Tommy Thigpen.
After a couple of days of confusion following the announcement and then redaction of Jay Bateman’s hiring at North Carolina, it was made official on Saturday.
Following Army’s 17-10 victory over rival Navy, the Black Knights’ defensive coordinator announced that he would be accepting the same role for Mack Brown’s North Carolina coaching staff.
SOURCE: #Army DC JAY BATEMAN has accepted the defensive coordinator job at #UNC. Terrific hire for Mack Brown. The hire was 1st reported by Inside Carolina.
— Bruce Feldman (@BruceFeldmanCFB) December 9, 2018
Bateman had been at Army for five seasons, finishing around the top-ten in total defense in each of the last two seasons. His team finished fourth in 2017, and currently 11th this season, ranking ninth in yards per game (294.0) and fifteenth in points per game (18.7).
With another terrific year for Bateman, he was named one of the five finalists earlier this week for the Broyles Award, which is given to the nation’s top assistant coach. It’s the first time in the award’s history that a coach from a service academy has been a finalist for the honor.
Besides his time at Army, Bateman had coached linebackers at Ball State and Elon. Beforehand, he also spent time as the defensive line coach at Lehigh, an assistant with Richmond and a head coach at Siena in the early 2000’s.
What will be much-needed is the improvement to Carolina’s third down defense and red zone percentage, both of which the Tar Heels struggled with mightily this season.
UNC was ranked 111th in third down defense this season, allowing a 44.7 percent conversation rate, whereas Army ranked third in the same category with only a 27.2 percent conversation rate.
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More importantly, when it comes to red zone efficiency and red zone scoring percentage, Army finished this season with a top-ten defense in that category, whereas the Tar Heels finished ranked 75th nationally.
Bateman will join Tommy Thigpen as co-defensive coordinator, although it would seem that with Bateman’s success following him everywhere he has coached, he may have the upper hand when it comes to more of the fundamentals on that side of the ball.
With all the recent news surrounding the Carolina program, assistant coach Tim Brewster said it best with his most recent tweet.
What an amazing weekend in Chapel Hill!! This is going to be fun‼️ #ItsATarHeelState!!
— Tim Brewster (@TimBrewster) December 9, 2018
Continue to follow @KeepintItHeel on twitter for all the latest on Carolina athletics.