North Carolina coach Bill Belichick said he is focused on Wake Forest, after questions about potential interest in the vacant New York Giants head coaching job.

During his Tuesday news conference in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, Belichick was asked what his message was to the team given the speculation about the newly opened job.

“Getting ready for Wake Forest, that’s all I got this week,” Belichick said.

As a follow-up, Belichick was asked whether players or recruits have inquired about the speculation that began after the Giants fired Brian Daboll on Monday.

“I’ve been asked about it from time to time,” Belichick said. “Look I’ve been down this road before. I’m focused on Wake Forest, that’s it. That’s my commitment to this team. This week it’s Wake Forest, next week it’s that opponent and so forth. I’m here to do the best for this team.”

Belichick is in his first season with North Carolina, which has won two straight games to bring its record to 4-5. Before coming to college coaching, Belichick spent his entire career in the NFL — winning six Super Bowls with the New England Patriots.

But he won two Super Bowls with the New York Giants as a defensive coordinator under Bill Parcells in the 1986 and 1990 seasons. Belichick often references Giants Hall of Fame linebacker Lawrence Taylor, who went to North Carolina and attended the season opener against TCU in Chapel Hill.

Maryland coach Mike Locksley said he’s not coaching for his job despite the team’s five consecutive Big Ten losses and continued struggles in league games and late in the season.

Locksley told reporters Tuesday that he deserves to keep his job, saying, “I’m the head coach at the University of Maryland.” After a 4-0 start, Maryland sits at 4-5 entering Saturday’s game at Illinois.

The Terrapins are just 17-45 in Big Ten games under Locksley, who has won 18 consecutive nonleague games at the school. Locksley is 37-46 overall at Maryland and is under contract through the 2027 season. His buyout if fired this year would be $13.4 million.

First-year athletic director Jim Smith, when asked by The Baltimore Sun whether Locksley would return in 2026, told the newspaper that his status would be determined at the end of the year. Smith did not hire Locksley and took over as athletic director in May after serving as Atlanta Braves senior vice president of business strategy.

After Illinois, Maryland finishes the regular season against No. 21 Michigan and Michigan State.

Emmanuel Clase had made over $12 million as a relief pitcher and was set to pocket an additional $6.4 million next season from the Cleveland Guardians. At just 27 years old with the ability to throw a 95 mph cutter, there were likely many more millions to come.

You’d think that would be enough to avoid possibly throwing it all away in a sports betting scandal.

Yet federal prosecutors allege that Clase, over the past few years, routinely conspired with a couple of as-yet-unnamed gamblers to throw certain pitches in certain ways so they could successfully bet on the outcome — below a specific speed, for example. (Yes, over/under 97.95 mph is a bet that is offered.)

Prosecutors said the gamblers involved won at least $400,000 in bets involving Clase. A portion, sometimes as little as $2,000 (fractional when compared with his salary), was allegedly kicked back to Clase.

That included a May 28, 2025, game against the Los Angeles Dodgers, where, a federal indictment states, two bettors wagered $4,000 that his first pitch would be either a ball or hit the batter.

Clase apparently did his part, throwing it low and out of the strike zone. Dodgers outfielder Andy Pages swung anyway, though, missing the ball for a strike.

The bet was a bust.

Clase went on to retire the side in order, securing a save in the Cleveland victory. It was of little help to the bettors, though, one of whom sent Clase a “.gif image of a man hanging himself with toilet paper,” per the indictment. Clase texted back “a sad puppy dog face.”

We can only imagine the emojis Clase has been using since his arrest on Sunday that didn’t cost him just the rest of that massive contract and a potential lifetime ban from Major League Baseball, but possibly up to 20 years in prison.

Everything potentially lost for so little.

Clase and Guardians starter Luis Ortiz — also indicted Sunday for similar alleged “pitch-rigging” activities — are innocent until proven guilty, of course, but if you are looking for a near sure thing to count on, it’s the feds. They rarely lose.

And that might be the only thing that can uphold the integrity of sports in America. At least we can hope.

Recent weeks have seen a parade of sports wagering scandals, schemes and indictments. Pro basketball. College basketball. Now MLB.

The accused range from the rich and famous to the broke and obscure, from young men to old heads. Trying to design a preventative, educational system seems impossible. Who can even explain the individual motivations or circumstances? Some needed money; others didn’t. Some were naive; others were worldly.

There is little in common between, say, a respected, 49-year-old Hall of Famer turned NBA coach such as Chauncey Billups, three players on the 4-27 University of New Orleans basketball team and a Dominican relief pitcher in the prime of his lucrative MLB career.

The way to stop this stuff is to stop it from starting. The fear of getting caught — and the fact that the federal government is catching people on a regular basis — might be the only thing that can scare everyone (or most everyone) straight.

Common sense says federal prosecutors won’t find everything. They are trying, though, with offices out of New York and Philadelphia busting people making small wagers on random pitches, the playing rotation of late-season NBA games and even hoops point spreads out of the obscure Southland Conference.

No one should think they are safe.

Gamblers, of course, have been fixing sports about as long as sports have existed. Baseball itself has seen a World Series compromised and its all-time hit king barred from Hall of Fame enshrinement due to this stuff.

A pitch in the Cleveland dirt somehow seems quaint.

Yet never before has sports wagering been so front of mind in America. Not only is it legal in 38 states and the District of Columbia, but teams, leagues, media outlets and everyone else are cashing in on the business. It’s on your TV. It’s on your phone. It’s in your face whether you gamble or not. Promo Code: Everywhere.

That has likely led to more temptation. Some of the college players have bet on themselves or participated in unsophisticated plots — one New Orleans player was allegedly overheard at a timeout telling two others to stop scoring to prevent their team from accidentally covering (the spread was 23; they lost by 25).

The good news? The ease of betting has also certainly led to easier detection, at least if bets are made through legal sources. The integrity monitoring systems are excellent.

There is a movement to ban individual prop bets, such as a player’s rebounding totals or the speed of a pitch. Those are easiest to manipulate, after all. MLB announced Monday that prominent U.S. sportsbooks are placing a $200 betting limit on baseball wagers centered on individual pitches and prohibiting such bets from being included in parlays in an attempt to decrease the incentive for manipulation. These are good ideas.

Yet sports wagering comes in many forms — legal, yes, but also through illegal books or offshore accounts. Then there is daily fantasy and the prediction market, where there is a near lack of government oversight.

This feels like whack-a-mole. Legislation is always a reaction, not a prevention.

In the end, the fear of being busted is about the only universal deterrent. Corruption is an individual decision, and prison is a powerful disincentive. No one wants to be the next guy sending sad puppy dog faces.