After His Sensational Sophomore Season,
Hampton Adds To UNC Legend, Preps For NFL
By David Glenn
North Carolina Sports Network
Coaches aren’t supposed to have favorite players, and even if they do, they’re not expected to share those sentiments publicly.
It’s safe to assume, though, that legendary North Carolina leader Mack Brown, who first became a head football coach 41 years ago, has a special place in his heart for UNC’s All-American running back, Omarion Hampton.
“Omarion is one of the nicest, hardest-working kids I’ve ever seen in my life,” Brown said. “If he speaks, it’s because you spoke to him, and he’s usually going to say, ‘Yes, sir.’ He doesn’t gripe, he never changes emotion. I mean, if he scores a touchdown, he looks at you the same way he does if he went the wrong way.
“He’s going to do what he’s supposed to do. He does everything perfect. He never misses classes, he’s always the first one in his seat, and he works so hard.”
One of the most highly recruited players on the UNC roster, Hampton was considered among the top five high school seniors in North Carolina and among the top 10 prep running backs in the nation in 2021, when he rushed for 1,948 yards and 39 touchdowns on 161 carries (12.1 yards per carry) for Cleveland High School in Clayton.
Hampton’s legend actually started two years earlier, when he was only a high school sophomore. There was a rumor that Hampton had lifted so much weight on a squat lift that the bar holding the extremely heavy plates on both ends started to bend dangerously in the middle.
Urban legend or true story?
“True story,” Hampton said. “After I did 560 (pounds), they had me stop going up after that. They told me the bar bent.”
How much weight could Hampton squat today?
“I’m not sure. We work with some big weights (at UNC), but we don’t do max lifts,” Hampton said. “If I tried to max out, I feel like it would be crazy.”
After taking official visits to Auburn, Florida, Penn State and UNC, Hampton committed to the Tar Heels during the summer before his senior year at Cleveland High. He liked the idea of staying close to home, and he appreciated how Brown had utilized running backs Michael Carter (a 1,000-yard rusher for Carolina in both 2019 and 2020) and Javonte Williams (a 1,000-yard rusher in 2020). Carter (fourth round) and Williams (second round) both became National Football League draft picks in 2021 and are now in their fourth NFL season.
In 2022, Hampton became the first UNC true freshman with 100 or more rushing yards in his first career game (against Florida A&M) since Carolina legend Charlie “Choo Choo” Justice had 102 yards against Virginia Tech in 1946. Hampton appeared in all 13 games for the Tar Heels that year and started four times.
In 2023, of course, Hampton had his breakthrough campaign, earning consensus All-America honors after rushing 253 times for 1,504 yards and 15 touchdowns. That marked the second-highest single-season rushing total in UNC history, behind only Don McCauley’s 1,720 yards in 1970.
During this past offseason, although Hampton did not enter the transfer portal (thus making it an NCAA rules violation for any other school to contact him), he reportedly received multiple overtures involving massive amounts of Name-Image-Likeness (NIL) money.
“In modern-day football, our fans talk about loyalty. (Hampton) got offered four times as much money to leave as he would make to stay here and never even considered it,” Brown said. “Think about loyalty. I mean, how much does that happen, modern-day?”
Prior to this season, Hampton politely declined to talk about the outside offers Brown mentioned, but he said he was thrilled to remain a Tar Heel and happy with the NIL money that came his way from UNC’s collective.
“It’s definitely helped me take care of my family a little bit and give back to the community a little bit,” Hampton said. “I also put it into savings as much as I can.”
Beyond his obvious, high-level production, the 6-0, 220-pound Hampton has made a name for himself — and even earned a nickname along the way — in a very specific statistical category, one you won’t find among the dozens of official NCAA stats: yards after contact.
According to Pro Football Focus (PFF), which analyzes every Football Bowl Subdivision game, Hampton had a national-best 1,072 yards after contact last season, meaning more than two-thirds of his (1,504) rushing yards came after he was hit by at least one defensive player.
How does Hampton do it?
“It’s really just working on it in the offseason, doing different balance drills, working with different trainers, and talking to different running backs, seeing what they do,” Hampton said. “I feel like it’s about staying on it consistently, really.”
Somewhere along his contact-filled path, Hampton picked up a new nickname: “Hammer.”
“I think Coach Brown called me that one time,” Hampton said, “and some guys just went with it.”
After the 2024 Tar Heels’ opener at Minnesota, PFF estimated that Hampton forced 17 missed tackles and that 114 of his 146 total yards (129 rushing, 17 receiving) came after contact. He was on pace for another big game (11 carries for 77 yards) against Charlotte, but Brown kept him out after seeing Hampton limp to the locker room after a first-half play.
“He gets mad when we take him out,” Brown said. “There were times in the spring and the preseason when we’d keep him out of scrimmages, because he’s now an experienced player at a dangerous position and we wanted to see some of the other backs, and we know he didn’t like (sitting out) at all. But he never complains.”
Hampton is expected to be available Saturday (6 pm, ACC Network Extra) when Carolina hosts NC Central, a Football Championship Subdivision team that is likely to be the weakest of the Tar Heels’ 2024 opponents.
It will be interesting to see how much playing time Hampton gets against the Eagles. On the one hand, every coach wants to keep his best players healthy. On the other hand, players usually want to play as much as possible, and at the end of the season the biggest national accolades typically go to those with the biggest numbers.
For example, a year ago, 45 FBS players rushed for 1,000 yards or more. Only five, including Hampton, rushed for 1,500 yards or more. That’s how you end up an All-American.
Hampton said he doesn’t think much about his numbers, and that his main focus is just helping the Tar Heels win.
“He’s just an absolute dream,” Brown said.
Meanwhile, as many speculate that Hampton will jump to the NFL after this season (his junior year), he said he hasn’t made that decision yet. He has, however, spent a considerable amount of time thinking about the NFL and how running backs are utilized at that level.
“He wanted to catch the ball better out of the backfield, he wanted to pass protect better,” Brown said. “I would say those are the two things that he has really, really worked on. He was a great receiver last year, so I think it’s route running. He has really worked on being more distinct in his routes, running away from man, sitting in zones, and doing those type things.”
As a teenager, Hampton looked up to then-NFL running back Marshawn Lynch, who was best known for his descriptive nickname (“Beast Mode”) and truly brutish running style. Lynch was a two-time All-Pro, a five-time Pro Bowler and a Super Bowl champion (with the Seahawks) during his 12-year NFL career.
In more recent years, Hampton said he has enjoyed watching super-sized, powerful backs such as Baltimore’s Derrick Henry (6-3, 247), but he has paid especially close attention to UNC’s Williams and Carter and other NFL backs who have shown they can run, of course, but also block reliably in pass protection and catch the ball consistently out of the backfield.
“I’m looking at (the 2024 season) as a growing experience, to show what I can do in the backfield,” Hampton said. “Use me more in the pass game, use me more in blocking, more toward like a Christian McCaffrey playing style, because I feel like that’s what The League is going to more. If I show them I can do that, it will help me in the long run.”
