UNC Football: Sam Howell is lone Tar Heels player on AP All-American list

The preseason accolades continue to roll in for UNC Football quarterback Sam Howell ahead of the 2021 season.

With Week 0 beginning this weekend with a really solid slate, the Associated Press announced their annual preseason All-American Team. The AP picks both the first and second teams for the upcoming season and this year, one UNC player made a team.

Howell was named the second-team quarterback finishing behind only Oklahoma’s Spencer Rattler who earned first-team honors. It’s the first time that Howell has been on the preseason All-American team for the AP and the expectations are high for the quarterback going into his junior year.

The quarterback has thrown for 7,227 yards, 68 touchdowns and just 14 interceptions while completing 64.4 percent of his attempts. He’s started from day one for North Carolina and has gotten better every year. Now going into year three, Howell not only has Atlantic Coast Conference title hopes for the Tar Heels but he’s a legit Heisman contender.

Iowa State and Notre Dame each had three players named to the preseason All-America first team while Alabama, Clemson, LSU, Texas A&M and Ohio State had two players each.

Miami and Boston College were the only two other ACC teams to have a player selected to a team by the AP, joining Clemson and North Carolina. Hurricanes punter Lou Hedley and Golden Eagles guard Zion Johnson were named to the preseason team.

The Tar Heels are set to open up their highly-anticipated 2021 campaign on the road at Virginia Tech on Friday, Sept. 3 in primetime on ESPN with kickoff set for 6 p.m.

For more on Howell and other UNC Football players, please check back with Keeping It Heel.