Carolina Way - Part 3 | Carolina's Favorite Son

Summary

Campus Files: Carolina Way - Part 3 | Carolina's Favorite Son

Episode Release Date: April 9, 2025
Host: Margo Gray
Guest: Holden Thorpe, Former Chancellor of UNC

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Introduction to Holden Thorpe and His Ties to UNC

Margo Gray begins the episode by reintroducing listeners to Holden Thorpe, the former Chancellor of the University of North Carolina (UNC) who oversaw the institution during one of its most challenging periods. Thorpe's deep-rooted connection to UNC is highlighted, emphasizing his lifelong dedication as a fan and his family's longstanding association with the university.

Holden Thorpe [03:15]: "My father and his father and all my father's brothers and lots and lots of people on my father's side of the family went to UNC Chapel Hill."

Growing up in Fayetteville, North Carolina, Thorpe was immersed in UNC culture from an early age, attending games and eventually becoming a die-hard Carolina basketball fan.

Thorpe’s Academic Journey and Ascension to Chancellorship

Thorpe's academic prowess is showcased as he transitions from a chemistry major with aspirations of becoming a physician to earning a PhD from Caltech and completing postdoctoral work at Yale. His return to UNC in 1993 marked the beginning of a rapid rise through the academic ranks, eventually leading to his appointment as Chancellor in 2007 at the young age of 43.

Holden Thorpe [05:34]: "I mean, I'm somebody who is very focused on getting things done... If there's a problem to be solved, I want to get it solved."

Despite his lack of experience in athletics management, Thorpe was selected for his strong academic background, political connections, and unwavering dedication to the university.

The Onset of Athletic Scandal at UNC

Thorpe's tenure as Chancellor coincided with the 2008 financial crisis and an emerging athletic scandal that would test his leadership. The scandal erupted when a football player publicly admitted to receiving bottle service at a Miami nightclub, leading to investigations that uncovered widespread academic fraud within the athletics department.

Holden Thorpe [09:13]: "You know, I've had good timing in my career, and I've had bad timing becoming the Chancellor of UNC Chapel Hill in 2008. That was just bad luck."

The revelation that tutors were writing papers for athletes to maintain their eligibility shattered the longstanding "Carolina Way" philosophy, which emphasized integrity both on and off the field.

Handling the Crisis: Initial Responses and Internal Investigations

In August 2010, Thorpe held an emergency press conference to address the scandal, immediately suspending twelve football players to demonstrate the university's commitment to integrity.

Holden Thorpe [14:12]: "And for a nerdy autistic guy who doesn't know how to work rooms, who's used to solving problems that have an analytical solution. That was one hell of a challenge."

However, Thorpe later reflects on his approach, acknowledging that delaying full transparency only exacerbated the situation.

Holden Thorpe [16:49]: "My big mistake was not explaining to the world what I'd figured out about Carolina athletics. Sooner than I did."

The internal investigation initially focused on misconduct from 2007 to 2011, ignoring signs that the issues dated back further. This limited scope was insufficient to address the widespread nature of the fraud.

Escalation of the Scandal and Resignation

Journalist Dan Cain's investigative reporting uncovered deeper layers of the scandal, revealing that the academic fraud had persisted for decades. This led to increased scrutiny and intensified pressure on Thorpe, ultimately culminating in his resignation in September 2012.

Holden Thorpe [18:23]: "If I could have found a way to go to Tar Heel Nation and said... we just weren't."

Despite the UNC Board of Trustees' unanimous support and requests for him to reconsider, Thorpe felt overwhelmed by the cumulative pressures from sports fans, trustees, and media.

Holden Thorpe [21:43]: "No, the people who wore me down were the people on the other side, the sports fans and the sports trustees."

Reflections on the Carolina Way and Systemic Issues

Thorpe critically examines the broader systemic issues within university administration and athletics, highlighting the clash between academic integrity and the pressures of maintaining competitive sports programs.

Holden Thorpe [23:50]: "You keep the jobs by managing all of the matters... Nobody's really solved that problem."

He emphasizes that the real culpability lies within the athletics department and administrative figures who perpetuated the fraud, rather than the athletes themselves.

Holden Thorpe [27:48]: "They were people who were just disadvantaged by the money and power that was going to somebody else."

Support for NIL and the Shift in Athlete Compensation

Thorpe voices strong support for the NCAA's name, image, and likeness (NIL) policies introduced in 2021, arguing that they rectify the exploitation of athletes by allowing them to profit from their personal brands.

Holden Thorpe [28:47]: "I have been on the side of giving the athletes more ever since that happened."

His endorsement of NIL marks him as one of the few former university leaders to publicly support these significant changes in college athletics.

Current Role and Closing Thoughts

Having transitioned away from university administration, Thorpe now serves as the editor-in-chief of Science magazine, returning to his roots in the scientific community. Despite his tumultuous tenure at UNC, he maintains his passion for college sports, albeit with a more informed perspective.

Holden Thorpe [29:42]: "I do. You know, the hilarious thing is I ended up being a big college football fan because once you learn that much about a game, it's much more enjoyable to watch it."

The episode concludes with a look toward UNC's future, including the audacious hiring of NFL legend Bill Belichick as the new head football coach, signaling the university's continued commitment to athletic excellence despite past controversies.

Holden Thorpe [30:15]: "The seats here at Kenan Stadium surely will be filled next season, and the university is banking on that to help the Tar Heels foot the bill for Belichick's multimillion dollar deal."

Conclusion

In "Carolina Way - Part 3 | Carolina's Favorite Son," Margo Gray and Holden Thorpe delve deep into the intricacies of leadership, integrity, and systemic challenges within a major American university. Thorpe's candid reflections provide listeners with an insider's perspective on managing crises, the complexities of university athletics, and the ongoing evolution of athlete compensation. This episode serves as a poignant exploration of how personal dedication intersects with institutional pressures, ultimately shaping the legacy of both a leader and the institution he served.

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Notable Quotes:

• Holden Thorpe [05:34]: "If there's a problem to be solved, I want to get it solved."

• Holden Thorpe [16:49]: "My big mistake was not explaining to the world what I'd figured out about Carolina athletics. Sooner than I did."

• Holden Thorpe [23:50]: "Nobody's really solved that problem."

• Holden Thorpe [28:47]: "I have been on the side of giving the athletes more ever since that happened."

• Holden Thorpe [30:15]: "The seats here at Kenan Stadium surely will be filled next season..."

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Credits:

Episode written and reported by Margo Gray. Produced by Ian Montgomery, Elliot Adler, and Margo Gray. Edited, mixed, and mastered by Chris Basel and Andy Jaskowicz. Special thanks to Jenna Weiss Berman, J.D. Crowley, Leah Rhys, and others.

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For more episodes exploring the hidden stories behind American colleges, including past seasons on the college admissions scandal, the NRA, and Jerry Falwell Jr. at Liberty University, visit Audacy’s Campus Files feed.

Transcript

[Margo Gray]

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[Holden Thorpe]

Please let her come back home safely.

[Margo Gray]

April 16th the kidnappers plumbed it meticulously.

[Holden Thorpe]

If money is what it takes to get her back, we're going to pay it.

[Margo Gray]

The secrets they hide.

[Holden Thorpe]

You can't talk about this. You can't write about it are the clues.

[Margo Gray]

The mother's hiding something.

[Holden Thorpe]

I know it.

[Margo Gray]

To find her, tell me where she is. The Stolen girl series premiere April 16 on Freeform and stream on Hulu. Before diving into this episode, make sure to listen to UNC parts 1 and 2. This one picks up right where we left off. The email took me by surprise. It landed in my inbox just as we were wrapping up the UNC story. The sender was Holden Thorpe, the former chancellor of unc. He was the guy in charge when the university faced one of the worst athletic scandals in the history of college sports. To refresh your memory, the scandal involved hundreds of fake classes created to keep athletes eligible. I'd reached out to Thorpe for an interview, expecting to hear nothing back. But then there it was in my inbox. Does this come with free Xanax? He joked. Then he said, JK, when would you like to do this?

[Holden Thorpe]

Okay, testing, 1, 2, 3. This is Holden Thorpe.

[Margo Gray]

I'm Margo Gray. This week on Campus Files, we explore what it was like to navigate one of the most tumultuous periods in UNC's history. What did Holdenthorpe really know? What would he do differently if given the chance? And can any university president manage the monstrosity that college athletics have become? Before we dive into Holden Thorpe's tenure as UNC chancellor, I want to give you a little background because Thorpe isn't just the former head of unc, he's a lifelong fan and his connection to the university runs deep.

[Holden Thorpe]

My father and his father and all my father's brothers and lots and lots of people on my father's side of the family went to UNC Chapel Hill. And so I was raised with Carolina Blue stuff all around and with all the legends and folklore of UNC Chapel Hill.

[Margo Gray]

When Thorpe couldn't sleep as a kid, his dad would try to lull him to rest by singing hark the sound. UNC's alma mater.

[Holden Thorpe]

I went there for the first time when I was 6 years old to go to the Moorhead Planetarium, which I eventually ended up running. And I went to football games and all that kind of stuff when I was a kid and was a die hard Carolina basketball fan long before I ended up being in charge of it.

[Margo Gray]

So when it came time for college, it was only fitting that he applied to just one university, unc.

[Holden Thorpe]

I went to Chapel Hill as a freshman right after UNC had won the 82 championship. So Michael Jordan played for UNC for two years while I was an undergraduate. And it was really the beginning of the golden years of UNC basketball.

[Margo Gray]

When Thorpe wasn't busy cheering on the tar heels, he was likely either playing jazz or working in the chemistry lab.

[Holden Thorpe]

Like a lot of young kids from medium sized towns like mine was Fayetteville, North Carolina. I thought I was wanted to be a physician, so I became a chemistry major because that was most of the requirements for pre med. But I changed my mind at the last second to get a PhD in chemistry instead of going to medical school.

[Margo Gray]

And so began Thorpe's lifetime in academia. He earned a doctorate in chemistry from Caltech and completed his postdoctoral work at Yale. His first teaching position was at NC State University. But it didn't take long before he was back at his alma mater. In 1993, Thorpe returned to UNC where he quickly rose from visiting assistant professor to tenured professor in addition to being promoted within the chemistry department. You're very quickly tapped for all sorts of administrative roles outside the chemistry lab. Director of the planetarium, chemistry department chair, dean of the College of Arts and sciences. Why do you think you were seen as a good fit for these roles?

[Holden Thorpe]

I mean, I'm somebody who is very focused on getting things done I've since come out as being autistic. I'm very task oriented. I'm very literal. If there's a problem to be solved, I want to get it solved.

[Margo Gray]

In 2007, when the role of Chancellor opened up, the UNC Board of Trustees quickly singled out Thorpe as a top candidate. The Chancellor is the highest ranking official at the university, essentially combining the roles of CEO, community leader and athletic director all in one. At the time of your interview, you were serving as dean, which is a role that's really focused on overseeing academics. But university chancellor, on the other hand, oversees all aspects of the institution, including athletics. I'm curious how much athletics came up during your interviews.

[Holden Thorpe]

Yeah, that's a great question. When I was interviewing for the job, there was one question about athletics and I said some weepy eyed things about Carolina basketball and how much I loved it. And I just got all the alumni all misty eyed about the Carolina blue and all that stuff. And that was the last they asked me.

[Margo Gray]

And at the time, what did you know about the inner workings of the athletic department?

[Holden Thorpe]

I mean, I knew about going to the games and stuff, but I knew next to nothing about how athletics really worked. And we had an experienced athletic director. And you have to remember that there was nowhere near their mind that we could have some kind of big scandal either.

[Margo Gray]

UNC hadn't dealt with the sports scandal in decades. Its record with the NCAA was spotless. So when it came time to select a new chancellor, no one saw the need to prioritize experience in athletics. Besides, whatever Holdenthorpe lacked in that area, he more than made up for elsewhere. He was a Fayetteville native, UNC graduate, lifelong Carolina sports fan, beloved professor and renowned academic.

[Holden Thorpe]

And also I had a lot of connections in Democratic politics. And it was a time when North Carolina was the unusual southern state in that it hadn't gone red. And so the leaders of Democratic politics in North Carolina were incredibly powerful. And one of the most powerful ones was my father's law partner. And so all of those things, I think added up to me being the person then pick for that job.

[Margo Gray]

This was news to me just how much political connections influenced the selection of university leaders. It's especially true at public universities like UNC that rely on taxpayer dollars.

[Holden Thorpe]

There's no way I would have become big chancellor at UNC at age 43 if it hadn't been for that. So all of those things, I think added up to me being the person picked for that job.

[Margo Gray]

Thank you.

[Holden Thorpe]

This is an incredible day for my family and me. I'M so grateful for the opportunity to lead the best university in the world. Thank you.

[Margo Gray]

At just 43, Thorpe was one of the youngest chancellors ever in UNC history.

[Holden Thorpe]

I think looking back, I definitely could have used a few more years in the administration. A lot changed after I got picked for that job. We had the 2008 financial crisis. The Republicans won the 2010 election and flipped North Carolina red. And we got an athletics crisis.

[Margo Gray]

And not just any athletics crisis, but one of the biggest scandals to ever rock college sports.

[Holden Thorpe]

You know, I've had good timing in my career, and I've had bad timing becoming the Chancellor of UNC Chapel Hill in 2008. That was just bad luck.

[Margo Gray]

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[Holden Thorpe]

Imagine if you could ask someone anything you wanted about their finances. How much do you make? Who paid for that fancy dinner? What did your house actually cost? On every episode of what We Spend, a different guest opens up their wallets. Opens up their lives, really? And tells us all about their finances. For one week, they tell us everything they spend their money on. My son slammed, like $6 worth of blueberries in five minutes. This is a podcast about all the ways money comes into our lives and then leaves again. Which, of course, we all have a lot of feelings about.

[Margo Gray]

I really want these things.

[Holden Thorpe]

I want to own a house. I want to have a child.

[Margo Gray]

But this morning, I really wanted a coffee.

[Holden Thorpe]

Because whatever you are buying or not buying or saving or spending, at the end of the day, money is always about more than your balance.

[Margo Gray]

Courtney.

[Holden Thorpe]

I'm Courtney Harrell, and this is what We Spend. Listen to and follow what We Spend and Odyssey Original podcast, available now wherever you get your podcasts.

[Margo Gray]

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[Holden Thorpe]

Oh, wow, A real person. Yep.

[Margo Gray]

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[Holden Thorpe]

Hmm. I just might have to do.

[Margo Gray]

Oh, okay. So the first room we're looking at is for guests, shop blinds.com now and get up to 45% off with minimum purchase. Blinds.com, rules and restrictions may apply at the start of Holden Thorpe's Chancellorship, UNC was riding high. In 2009, during his first full academic year as chancellor, the men's basketball team clinched the national championship. Welcome to the Then President Barack Obama honored the championship team at the White.

[Holden Thorpe]

House, its fifth national championship. And more importantly, thanks for salvaging my bracket.

[Margo Gray]

Whether Obama meant to or not, his remarks touched on the Carolina Way, the philosophy popularized under legendary coach Dean Smith. It's the belief that UNC excels not only on the court, but off of it as well. And it's a belief that endured at UNC long after Smith's tenure.

[Holden Thorpe]

I know Coach Williams instills the importance of academics into all these guys. What they understood is that being a champion doesn't stop when you step off the court.

[Margo Gray]

So at this point in your chancellorship, would you have described yourself as a believer in the Carolina Way philosophy?

[Holden Thorpe]

Oh yeah, I was raised on that philosophy. And so while I have great admiration for Dean Smith and what he accomplished, he did manage to convince people that they didn't need to look too closely at how it all worked by coming up with this whole Carolina Way idea. So that made it all the more difficult when I figured out there wasn't as much to it as everybody thought.

[Margo Gray]

The first crack in the Carolina way came in May 2010 when a football player tweeted about getting bottle service at a Miami nightclub. For the first time since 1961, NCAA investigators were heading to Chapel Hill. Initially, Thorpe thought the scandal might be manageable. It looked like a handful of players had accepted outside payments, but things quickly escalated. Thorpe soon learned that a tutor had been writing papers for football players, meaning this was now a case of academic fraud and a direct threat to the Carolina way.

[Holden Thorpe]

After 50 years of bragging about how we did athletics a different way, that was a cataclysmic event for the University of North Carolina, where I had to somehow go to Tar Heel Nation and tell them that the Carolina Way was dying because we were suddenly in all this trouble.

[Margo Gray]

On August 26, 2010, Thorpe held a last minute press conference to break the news to the university. Wearing a Carolina blue tie, he told the crowd, to everyone who loves this university, I'm sorry about what I have to tell you.

[Holden Thorpe]

And for a nerdy autistic guy who doesn't know how to work rooms, who's used to solving problems that have an analytical solution. That was one hell of a challenge.

[Margo Gray]

In an effort to show that the university was taking the scandal Seriously, Thorpe suspended 12 football players from the opening game against LSU. While the team battled it out on the field, Thorpe spent that game lying on the floor of his box.

[Holden Thorpe]

If we were lsu, we would have played everybody and told the NCAA to go away. And so there was this huge burden on me for deciding to pull all those guys. So the weight of all of the drama, of that, yeah, I could barely stand up.

[Margo Gray]

But the drama was only beginning to unfold. This was the moment when Dan Cain, the News and observer reporter we heard from last episode, uncovered trouble in the AFAM department. He published a story revealing that a football player had taken a senior level AFAM course before his freshman year and earned a good grade in the class. Thorpe had a bad feeling.

[Holden Thorpe]

I called over to the public records officer and I said, get the roster for that class. And she gets it and she starts reading the names off of the roll and it's a who's who of Carolina athletics. And every name she read off, my soul just got crushed because I knew that as soon as she read that roll off that this thing was a whole lot worse than I thought. I thought we just had a bad tutor who was writing people's papers for them and. But once I got the role of that first AF AM class, I knew we were in big trouble because it was apparent to me right that second what the scheme was.

[Margo Gray]

I want to pause here for a moment. Thorpe is acknowledging that in August 2011, long before the university publicly admitted to the paper class scheme and years before the investigations were concluded, he had a clear understanding of the scheme that had been taking place. He understood that the AFAM department was offering fake courses that never actually met and required no work. He understood that the primary purpose of the scheme was to keep athletes eligible, primarily basketball and football players. And he knew it had been going on for decades. Instead of coming clean about what he already knew, Thorpe chose to buy the university some time. He launched an internal investigation, a move he now describes as putting the problem on a credit card.

[Holden Thorpe]

Because you're telling the media, oh, I'm not going to answer this until the report gets done. Well, that sounds pretty good while you're doing it, but the problem is credit cards have 18% interest. And so the longer you go on putting it on the credit card, the bigger the bill is when the report comes. My big mistake was not explaining to the world what I'd figured out about Carolina athletics. Sooner than I did.

[Margo Gray]

I also think this first investigation was never going to be the final word because it only looked at the classes from 2007 to 2011. Why stop at 2007 when there were signs that the problem went back much further?

[Holden Thorpe]

So, yeah, of course I knew it went back further than that. But the reason we did 2011-2007 was that that was what Dan had in his first public records request.

[Margo Gray]

In other words, they only looked back as far as they had to. Dan Cain hadn't requested records from earlier decades, so they saw no reason to dig deeper. The problem with that strategy was that Dan Cain eventually figured out that the scandal went back much further, and his discovery unleashed another wave of bad headlines, tougher questions, and yet another investigation. This became a familiar pattern. Every time UNC tried to tell only part of the story or hide behind an investigation, the truth had a way of catching up with them and making things even worse. So sitting here today, if you could go back to that moment, what would you have done differently?

[Holden Thorpe]

It would have been best if I could have found a way to go to Tar Heel Nation and said, listen, everybody, I know this Carolina Way thing was really intoxicating to think that we were doing all this winning without being as corrupt as Alabama and Auburn and LSU and whoever you want to name. But we just weren't.

[Margo Gray]

Breaking the news would not have been easy, particularly for Holden Thorpe, a lifelong Carolina fan who had not yet come to terms with the death of the Carolina Way himself.

[Holden Thorpe]

If I could have found my way to realize it myself sooner and stop looking at the world through Carolina blue glasses, then that might have been better for everybody.

[Margo Gray]

Instead, Thorpe spent the next year dodging questions from reporters and clinging desperately to the Carolina Way. But even he knew he couldn't hold on forever.

[Holden Thorpe]

We're shipping Easter gifts with a rapid.

[Margo Gray]

Fire round of questions.

[Holden Thorpe]

Ready? Yes. My gift.

[Margo Gray]

Can you pack it? Yep. Ship it?

[Holden Thorpe]

Yes.

[Margo Gray]

Guarantee it?

[Holden Thorpe]

Of course.

[Margo Gray]

Oh, send gift baskets for sure. Protect electronics. Dog proof it. Return it if they hate it.

[Holden Thorpe]

Yes, no and yeah.

[Margo Gray]

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[Holden Thorpe]

Were just as online. You know, Oxford's was brain rot, if.

[Margo Gray]

You can believe it. Its first use was in 1854 by Henry David Thoreau.

[Holden Thorpe]

RIP Henry David Thoreau. You would have hated TikTok. Wait, Candace, we should probably introduce ourselves.

[Margo Gray]

You're so right, Kate. Hello, listeners. We are the hosts of icymi, or rather in Keystone.

[Holden Thorpe]

You missed it.

[Margo Gray]

Slate's podcast about Internet culture.

[Holden Thorpe]

We're extremely online, so you don't have to be. Follow ICYMI now, wherever you listen.

[Margo Gray]

On September 17, 2012, Holden Thorpe announced he was resigning as Chancellor of UNC. The final blow wasn't tied to athletics, but instead to a separate scandal, one involving university fundraisers using school funds for personal trips. As the Chronicle of Higher Education put it, it was death by a thousand cuts for Holden Thorpe.

[Holden Thorpe]

Now, the mood on campus today has been vacillating between shock and surprise. Some people said they thought they saw this coming, but there's also been a lot of tears on campus today from faculty members, even from some.

[Margo Gray]

Thorpe's resignation was met with sadness on campus. The university's board of Trustees urged him to reconsider writing the UNC Chapel Hill Board of Trustees unanimously believes Carolina is better today because of him and emphatically requests that Chancellor Thorpe reconsider his decision. But Thorpe had reached his limit. So I believe when you broke the news to the faculty chair that you were resigning, you said it was because, quote, they wore me down. Who exactly wore you down?

[Holden Thorpe]

Yeah, that's something that's been badly interpreted because the News and Observer wrote an editorial basically congratulating themselves for being the ones who wore me down. And I never thought that Dan King was doing anything other than his job. And while I disagreed with the News and Observer editorial board, they were writing what they had always written about college sports. No, the people who wore me down were the people on the other side, the sports fans and the sports trustees.

[Margo Gray]

When Thorpe talks about sports trustees, he's referring to UNC board members with close ties to the athletic program. This group was a major headache for Thorpe throughout the scandal.

[Holden Thorpe]

They were just constantly telling me, oh, why don't you just tell all these people to go away and ignore this and hire attorneys who can go fight it?

[Margo Gray]

Thorpe was stuck in the middle. Sports fans, on the one hand blasted him for working with the ncaa, while journalists accused him of covering up the truth. But the main force shaping his decisions wasn't either group. It was the crisis management team around him. They influenced his every move.

[Holden Thorpe]

These universities are so paralyzed about doing and saying the wrong thing that they're holed up. They're hiding behind their comms people and their attorneys and their reputation consultants.

[Margo Gray]

The crisis management team held so much power partly because Thorpe had no experience handling scandals. He's an academic like most university leaders.

[Holden Thorpe]

You get these jobs by convincing the board that you're going to build academic success, a get more Rhodes scholarships and climb in the rankings and all that stuff. But you keep the jobs by managing all of the matters, as we used to call them, that come up. So do you take somebody who knows the academic side and teach them how to run all these things, or do you take somebody who's an excellent general manager and try to get them to understand the intricacies of academia? Nobody's really solved that problem.

[Margo Gray]

In other words, there's often a disconnect between the skill sets of college presidents and the actual demands of the role. Thorpe experienced this firsthand during the athletic scandal. Despite having no background in college sports, he was tasked with leading the institution through the crisis. Thorpe writes about this disconnect in a recent article for the Chronicle of Higher Education titled Where does the College Presidency Go from Here? The job is increasingly untenable. Change is needed.

[Holden Thorpe]

The universities are way too complicated and they're trying to do too many different things. And so that's where the problem comes from. And why are you running a sports entertainment enterprise and a hotel and a fire department and a police department and, you know, all these things that these universities are doing, most of which are distractions from research and teaching. So that's the problem. Now, unfortunately, that's a genie that's very hard to put back in a bottle.

[Margo Gray]

Even with his concerns about university leadership, Thorpe took on another administrative role. In July 2013, he became provost at Washington University in St. Louis. From this new position, far from Chapel Hill, he watched as the ticking time bomb at UNC finally went off. In 2014, former FBI General Counsel Kenneth Wainstein completed his investigation into uncle academic misconduct and released an explosive tell all report. The University of North Carolina today reeling from a blow, a really big blow to its reputation. An eight month investigation found thousands of UNC athletes remained eligible to play by taking fake classes that fraudulently boosted their grades. And was there anything in the report that Weinstein discovered that was at all shocking or surprising to you as far as the story?

[Holden Thorpe]

No, nothing in there was surprising to me. I had talked to him at length, actually. He brought his daughter to Toro Washu, like the week the report came out. And so the two of us had a long dinner three or four days after the report came out, talking about everything that we'd both been through with the whole thing.

[Margo Gray]

I would argue that the Wainstein report really put the nail in the coffin of the Carolina way, so to speak. How do you think Tar Heel fans reacted to this? You know, the realization that at the end of the day, they were maybe no better than the other schools, which had been cutting corners.

[Holden Thorpe]

Most of our fans, once they were forced to choose between whether they cared more about winning or cared more about the Carolina way, turns out they cared more about winning.

[Margo Gray]

When I asked him if prioritizing winning means UNC is still cutting corners to keep players eligible, Thorpe shared a telling anecdote.

[Holden Thorpe]

When you go to hire a football coach, first thing they want to know is, what's the admissions policy? Because they don't want the admissions challenges to constrain them from winning. So when you're hiring a football coach or basketball or anybody else, you're telling them basically, look, the students have to succeed in our majors somehow. But you can recruit anybody you want. That's the lesson of all this, is that if you're going to compete in intercollegiate athletics, you're going to have these challenges. There's just too much in the system to stop it.

[Margo Gray]

And would you say you place more blame on the system itself rather than on an individual like Debbie Crowder?

[Holden Thorpe]

The people who gained from the AFAM scheme are the athletics department, the coaches, the administrators, who had fewer problems to deal with because this was there. Those are the people, the powerful people in these transactions, Debbie Crowder and the athletes, they don't deserve any of the blame for this. They were people who were just disadvantaged by the money and power that was going to somebody else.

[Margo Gray]

Thorpe noted that today, some of that money and power is shifting back to the athletes, thanks to a recent NCAA policy change. As of 2021, the introduction of name, image and likeness rules, also known as nil, has allowed college athletes to profit from their personal brands.

[Holden Thorpe]

I mean, everything that we got nailed for in the extra benefits part of the case would be legal now. So maybe nobody would have ever found the ticking time bomb in afam. I'm very much in favor of nil. When I saw how little money was involved in getting these athletes to take money that they weren't supposed to take, it just showed me how much they're exploited. You know, I remember we had one athlete who just wanted to get a free meal at the Cheesecake Factory. And so I have been on the side of giving the athletes more ever since that happened.

[Margo Gray]

This makes Thorpe one of the very few current or former university leaders who have publicly supported nil.

[Holden Thorpe]

I know NIL is a huge complication for the athletic directors, but as far as I'm concerned, too bad you guys go figure it out. You're making a lot of bank running these programs. These are people who've been doing the work of sports for all this time, and if they're finally going to get compensated for it, that's good. You go work it out.

[Margo Gray]

Whatever Thorpe's thoughts on NIL or NCAA rules, he no longer has to concern himself with them. Today, he's come full circle back to where it all began, immersed once again in the world of science. He serves as the editor in chief of Science magazine. Okay, so I must admit I have been waiting to ask, after everything that you dealt with, do you still tune in for Carolina games?

[Holden Thorpe]

I do. You know, the hilarious thing is I ended up being a big college football fan because once you learn that much about a game, it's much more enjoyable to watch it.

[Margo Gray]

UNC's dedication to athletics is as strong as ever. Just take a look at their recent decision to sign Bill Belichick as their new head football coach. A six time champion, a football savant, without question the greatest. Today Belichick is a coaching legend with the second most career wins in NFL history.

[Holden Thorpe]

The seats here at Kenan Stadium surely will be filled next season, and the university is banking on that to help the Tar Heels foot the bill for Belichick's multimillion dollar deal.

[Margo Gray]

Over the next five years, UNC will guarantee Belichick $50 million, with more than 3 million annually in potential bonuses following Belichick's hire. UNC Chancellor Lee Roberts said Carolina is committed to excellence and to creating an opportunity to succeed in everything we do, from the classroom to the field of competition. Campus Files is an Odyssey Original Podcast this episode was written and reported by Margo Gray. Campus Files is produced by Ian Montgomery, Elliot Adler and me, Margo Gray. Our executive producers and story editors are Maddie Sprunkheiser and Lloyd Lockridge. Campus Files is edited, mixed and mastered by Chris Basel and Andy Jaskowicz. Special thanks to Jenna Weiss Berman, J.D. crowley, Leah Rhys, Dennis, Maura Curran, Josephina Francis, Kurt Courtney, Hilary Schuff, Sean Cherry, Laura Berman and Hilary Van Ornam. Original theme music by James Waterman and Davey Sumner. If you have tips or story ideas, write to [e-mail] Some people play it safe, but that's never been my style. I'm Saraya and this is Rule breakers, the podcast where we celebrate the rebels, the misfits, and the ones who make their own way. Every week I sit down with athletes, entertainers and industry disruptors who don't just push the boundaries. Now they shatter them. We talk about the wildest risks they've taken, the lessons they've learned, and the moments that made them who they are. No fillers, no bs, just real talk of people who refuse to follow the script. And we don't just talk about breaking the rules now we prove it. Think dog shot collars, bug trivia, blindfold tattoos, and text roulette. The stakes are high and the chaos is real. So if you've ever been told to stay in your lane, this show is for you. Follow and listen to Rule breakers with Saraya, an Odyssey podcast, available now for free on the Odyssey app and wherever you get your podcasts.