There’s no place like Lawrence for Williams

By Bill Mayer     Jul 8, 2000

More than 40 percent of the people now residing here have lived in Lawrence five years or less. Extensive Journal-World readership surveys have repeatedly reached that conclusion. So what does that have to do with Roy Williams’ decision to bypass the North Carolina basketball job and remain at Kansas?

Answer: A number of population changes which have occurred here in the past couple decades or so have also been happening in and around Chapel Hill, N.C., where UNC is based. So Roy and his wife, Wanda, have more general friendships here now than they have in the Carolinas, give or take a few relatives, Dean Smith, Bill Guthridge and such. That certainly didn’t hurt KU’s chances.

From the start of the week-long riddle about whether Roy would stay or go, friends of the coach steadfastly contended that his KU players and his intense loyalty to them would be the final filter, the swing vote, the piece de resistance for Kansas. Buddies like Jerry Waugh and Max Falkenstien were dead-on, saying from the start they thought it was better than 50-50 Williams would lengthen his 12-year tenure.

Let’s return to the demographics. Think back 12 years, if you’ve been here that long. Consider how long it took you in the 1970s and 1980s to finish at the supermarket because of all the acquaintances and visitations you’d encounter. Nowadays, you can shop at one of our major outlets and in a half-hour period might not see anyone you really know. You go to funerals of old-timers and there are many familiar faces. But they don’t fan out and dominate the general scene as they once did.

While Roy and Wanda, both 50, were Tar Heel born-and-bred and have family back east, they also have realized that there aren’t nearly as many of the “old nesters” they once knew and hob-nobbed with. Meanwhile, a slew of their friends are right here in and about River City. And River City, with Roy as Prof. Harold Hill, has had a lot of doggone melodious (Roy’s) Boys Bands since 1988.

If you know nothing else about Roy Williams, Bill Guthridge, Dean Smith and that genre of Carolina basketball mainstays, you know that while it may not be spoken too often, “loyalty” is the key to the whole operation at UNC and at Kansas, particularly since Roy took charge. Roy couldn’t go against that strong tide, particularly the current kids he has brought in. Nobody understands better than Smith and Co. including former Carolina players why it was the coup de grace.

Some will say that since his son, Scott, is in banking in Charlotte and daughter, Kimberly, is a UNC student, they are amazed Roy and Wanda didn’t opt to join them and other relatives, including Wanda’s parents. Get real. In today’s world you can make a big mistake by trying to stalk your kids everywhere.

Scott could be moved to another banking post, Kimberly could graduate, get a non-Carolina job and even get married to a guy who has to leave the region. Roy and Wanda should anchor their lives to that uncertain scenario? I know a number of folks who have started out that way and have eventually realized “you can’t count on kids staying put.”

Roy doesn’t think Carolina people realize what he has here and that Kansas faithful don’t fully comprehend the Carolina mystique. Mostly true, but I think the UNC folks are more inclined to look down on us hicks in the sticks than we are to understand all they have going for them. A lot more of us have seen what they have than they have sampled our wares.

Me, I’m a disgusting provincialist, same as they. I’ve said often that I’ll take 10 KU and Kansas State people who are good in their fields, any fields, and go head to head against 10 from any other school or region you can name, and more often than not I’ll whip their butts pick any field, sports, academics, medicine, business. We too often sell ourselves short. We need more Texas-type ego and braggadocio.

Yet let those outsiders titter about the Land of Oz and its alleged shortcomings. Heck, I don’t want dolts like that coming out here and spoiling what we have.

Then there’s the aspect of legendary for KU and North Carolina. Don’t think for a minute Roy Williams would be considered a successor to Guthridge. He would be compared to Dean Smith. At Kansas, Dick Harp had eight years, Ted Owens 19 and Larry Brown five to give Roy Williams a huge buffer between the late Phog Allen, icon that he was. At Carolina, Smith still lives, gets to his Smith Center office regularly and will always be a presence. Phog’s spirit persists, his body doesn’t.

At UCLA, John Wooden lives on. Has anyone, including former stars Walt Hazzard and Larry Farmer, been able to establish dominance even though Wooden has been retired for 25 years?

Roy has his own show, and a damned good one. He turns a $4 million-plus profit each year. We folks who are about to shell out $962 for two 2000-01 season tickets wouldn’t be nearly as generous if Roy were gone, and there was no certainty about whether the new guy could tote the torch with the flare and illumination that Williams generates. Had he left, it would have been the heaviest KU coaching loss since track coach Bill Easton dominated the scene up to the mid-1960s, with a number of national titles to his credit. Trouble is, Bill’s programs, great as they were, never could turn a $4 million profit and KU’s desperate to boost that and build similar input from football.

(It’s not widely known, but the modest Roy and Wanda already have contributed more than a million bucks to worthwhile KU ventures.)

Then there are the standing armies at KU and UNC. For my money, Roy Williams has a better cadre of players here than he would have inherited at Carolina. Take the Three Musketeers (sophomores-to-be Drew Gooden, Nick Collison and Kirk Hinrich), add Kenny Gregory, Eric Chenowith, Jeff Boschee, Jeff Carey, Luke Axtell and John Crider. Unless Roy could have signed some superstar newcomers, his Carolina roster would not have been that good. The kids here already know the territory and the system.

It’s those “kids” who were instrumental in making their coach’s loyalty paramount in his choice between loyalty to his troops and a lifelong dream job.

While there’s pressure on Roy Williams to keep giving us strong lessons in excellence and citizenship, those players also ought to feel compelled to play their butts off to justify the tremendous vote of confidence from a guy who cared enough to send them the very best himself.

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