CHAPEL HILL, N.C. --- North Carolina is now less than a month away from the beginning of the 202o early signing period. On Dec. 18, at least 26 UNC verbal commitments are expected to send in their national letter of intent to officially become Tar Heels. The 2020 class is head coach Mack Brown and his staff's first full recruiting cycle back at North Carolina.

UNC's 2020 class comprises 26 prospects and is ranked No. 16 in the nation and No. 2 in the ACC. The Tar Heels are waiting on a decision and announcement from 247Sports Composite four-star linebacker Trenton Simpson, who is a strong Carolina lean, according to Inside Carolina's Don Callahan. A Charlotte native, Simpson is the No. 13 overall player, the No. 2 outside linebacker, and a five-star prospect in the 247Sports rankings.

In addition to Simpson, there are a few other targets that the Tar Heels are eyeing to round out the class.

"You just keep recruiting them. That’s what you do," Brown said. "You constantly recruit them and you try to figure out what kind of chance you’ve got. You don’t want to be foolish and spend a lot of time with somebody you have no chance to get and then it cost you another one."

Brown said the next few weeks is just about maintaining communication with the current commitments and getting set for the big official visit weekends on the horizon. "You constantly have contact with the guys. We have official visits set up, we have a weekend, I think the 6th and 7th, and a huge weekend for the 13th and 14th. So, we’ll bring all the guys that haven’t been on official visits in. A lot of them will still come to the game this weekend with Mercer and then you plan on all of them signing on the 18th."

Signing on Dec. 18 rather than the second date in February has been encouraged and communicated with each prospect.

"Most of them want to," Brown said. "If he doesn’t sign on this date -- let’s put it this way: if you were engaged and had your marriage date set and she said, ‘I’m going to move it back a month,’ you’d probably wonder why. If they’ve told you they’re signing on signing day and they don’t, there’s concern.

"Football and recruiting are simple; people are complicated," Brown added.

Brown said that 12 prospects are expected to enroll early in January to get a head start on the strength and conditioning program and take part in spring practice. It is a huge advantage for those prospects and gives them a better chance to contribute as true freshmen. UNC would love to have more prospects enroll in January, but scholarship limitations will only allow 12 this year.

"That’s an NCAA rule. It’s a problem; we’ve got more guys wanting to come than we can (take), but you have to have a guy graduate in December before you can replace him and I hate that," Brown said. "We’re going to have (some current UNC players) that are going to graduate in June that aren’t going to be on our team and aren’t going to play in the spring, and we can’t bring these guys in. We’ve got some really bright kids that want to come early and I hope that’s a rule we can change."

Bringing in a top 20 recruiting class stacked with four-star prospects and a lot of the top in-state talent is a big switch from the final years of the Larry Fedora era and a huge improvement from Brown and UNC's 2019 class, which was put together in just a few weeks once the new staff got on campus.

Brown said they had to change the perception of UNC to gain momentum in recruiting.

"That we were the cool place to be," Brown said when asked the biggest challenge in changing the perception of UNC. "We’ve lost so many in-state guys. When we were here before, we built this on in-state guys and great players from out of state, if there was a player from out of state that was better than the in-state player. We are the state university and the high school coaches love having us win because it sends a message about high school football across the country when we win as well.

"I think that’s the biggest thing is, ‘It’s OK to come here again; we’re going to win, we’re going to have full houses, we’ve got great facilities and the future is very bright.’

UNC could land six of the top 11 prospects in the state of North Carolina for this cycle. Looking ahead, that is a huge step in changing the perception for the top in-state prospects.

"When we were here before, the guys that were here recruited the other ones," Brown explained. "When you have a great one come here like a Greg Ellis, like a Dre Bly, like a Brian Simmons, Ryan Sims, Ebenezer Ekuban, you start checking that list; they recruit others like them. When a guy that’s out there can see that the best player in the state or the five best players in the state are coming, they say, ‘This is pretty cool, I want to be on that team.’ Everybody wants to win and they want to join other guys that win with them."