Six-time Super Bowl-winning head coach Bill Belichick has agreed to a five-year deal to become the next coach at the University of North Carolina (UNC).

The college confirmed the signing on Wednesday night, roughly a week after 72-year-old Belichick's name surfaced as an unlikely candidate to replace the programme's most successful-ever coach Mack Brown.

The deal requires approval by UNC trustees, with a press conference unveiling Belichick to be held in due course.

"I am excited for the opportunity at UNC-Chapel Hill," he said.

"I grew up around college football with my dad and treasured those times. I have always wanted to coach in college and now I look forward to building the football programme in Chapel Hill."

UNC athletics director Bubba Cunningham: "We know that college athletics is changing, and those changes require new and innovative thinking.

"Bill Belichick is a football legend, and hiring him to lead our programme represents a new approach that will ensure Carolina football can evolve, compete and win - today and in the future."

The university announced last month that Brown would not return for a seventh season in his second stint in Chapel Hill.

Moving on from Brown, 73, to hire Belichick, 72, means UNC are turning to a coach who has never worked at the college level, yet had incredible success in the NFL alongside quarterback Tom Brady throughout most of his 24-year tenure with the Patriots, which ended last season.

Belichick had been linked to NFL jobs in the time since, notably the Atlanta Falcons in January.

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