What are the North Carolina Tar Heels' best fits in conference realignment?

What college sports fans once knew as the ACC, Big 10, Big 12, SEC and Pac-12 – all look significantly different now and are in danger of dissolving completely.

Talks of teams changing conferences ramped up a few years ago, but never came to fruition until recently.

We saw the greatest exodus from the Pac-12, with 10 of its 12 teams leaving. Arizona, Arizona State, Colorado and Utah left for the Big 12, UCLA, Oregon, USC and Washington are now members of the Big 10, while Cal and Stanford are in the ACC – despite not being remotely close to the Atlantic Coast. I think the newly-formed Big 12 and Big 10 are going to be strong basketball conferences – maybe not at the ACC's level, but close to it.

Texas and Oklahoma are joining the SEC, giving the nation's top football conference two more historic powers. They both come from the Big 12, which is not as strong a football conference, so year one in the SEC could be an adjustment.

The North Carolina Tar Heels, a flagship member of the ACC, have been able to avoid conference realignment – for now. It's only a matter of time before UNC likely joins a "mega-conference," which will likely be anchored by the Big 10, Big 12 or SEC.

I would hate to see North Carolina leave the conference where it has enjoyed a tremendous amount of success, but that's just the nature of college sports these days.

With the inevitable coming, let's take a deeper dive into the Tar Heels' best fits for conference realignment:

SEC

Does UNC to the SEC make a lot of sense?

Technically, Chapel Hill is in the southeast, so this potential move could be seen as a geographical one.

The SEC is best known for football success, particularly with Georgia and Alabama in recent years. If you've watched Tar Heel football in the past decade, you might think our team would get destroyed in the SEC.

I think that's a fair assumption to make, though North Carolina did beat South Carolina last year. UNC would fit better into the SEC because of its basketball program, as UNC could compete atop its possible new conference with the likes of Alabama and Kentucky.

The SEC is a basketball conference on the rise, so the Tar Heels wouldn't be guaranteed immediate success.

Big 10

I like the Big 10 a lot better as a potential fit for UNC, based on the success of its football and basketball programs being in line with current Big 10 schools.

The Tar Heels would compete atop the conference in basketball with Purdue and Illinois, assuming Hubert Davis is still able to recruit strong talent. Outside of Purdue, Illinois and Michigan State, the rest of the Big 10 is up for grabs.

Big 10 football also reminds me a lot of the ACC – a couple strong teams (Michigan, Ohio State, Penn State) atop the conference, then unpredictability from the rest.

Last year, North Carolina beat Minnesota 31-13 in the inaugural football clash between both programs, showing it can compete with the Big 10. The Tar Heels also dominated Michigan in the former ACC-Big 10 basketball challenge.

Big 12

The Big 12 gives me a lot of ACC vibes – having basketball programs that can compete with anyone, plus a football conference which has everyone vying for the championship.

Eight Big 12 schools made the NCAA Tournament last year, with Houston and Iowa State going the furthest. Texas made the College Football Playoff, but it's now in the SEC.

I could see UNC in a logjam atop the Big 12 basketball standings, though I think football would perform much better – compared to the SEC and Big 10.

Stay in ACC

Being one of the ACC's original seven programs, it wouldn't make sense for North Carolina to leave and join a new super-conference, despite that being the trend amongst other conferences.

While UNC's success in the ACC is largely tied to its men's basketball program – six national championships, 18 ACC Tournament titles and 31 ACC Regular Season titles (since joining the ACC), football enjoyed its fair share of past successes.

The Tar Heels won five ACC Football Championships (1963, 1971, 1972, 1977, 1980) and two Atlantic Division Championship (2015, 2022). In recent years, despite the lack of postseason success, North Carolina brought in the likes of highly-touted quarterbacks Sam Howell and Drake Maye.

I'm making my case for UNC to stay in the ACC. Maybe other teams can look at the Tar Heels' success and say, "hey, we'd like to be a part of that."

Could UNC form a new conference?

UNC has a strong enough following that, if it wanted to form its own conference, plenty of schools would follow.

Would North Carolina try to create an original ACC, re-adding the likes of Maryland and South Carolina? How about a conference with in-state schools only – Duke, NC State, Wake Forest, East Carolina – or one with just Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina programs?

This scenario is the most intriguing to me. There's a million directions the Tar Heel could go here, including the likes of forming a new ACC – with schools that are actually on the Atlantic Coast.