Reached by phone Friday night while he was standing in the airport security line for a flight to Boston, North Carolina basketball coach Roy Williams said mentor Dean Smith had “almost nothing to do with” his decision to leave Kansas University after the 2002-2003 season.
Why did Williams, three years after declining an offer to go back home, return to his alma mater?
“I felt I gave 15 years of my heart, body and soul and said no to go home the first time,” Williams said. “Then my own situation changed. We changed athletic directors. That made a huge, huge, huger-than-huge difference. My dad was struggling and died a year later. My sister started to struggle and was going into assisted living with Alzheimer’s. It boiled down to No. 1, the last two years the whole job changed. No. 2, I was going back home. No. 3, personal things. I didn’t want to be the rich little brother sending checks home.”
Williams was aware Smith is in Lawrence with teammates from KU’s 1952 national championship basketball team and wanted to dispel any notion that Smith, the legendary retired Tar Heels coach under whom he started his coaching career, was a driving force behind his leaving Kansas to replace Matt Doherty.
“If there was any recruiting at all, he did more the first time than the did in 2003,” Williams said of Smith, who will be honored with teammates at halftime of today’s game against Nebraska.
“His involvement was even less the second time. The first time he said, ‘I want you to come back, but I know what a great job you have and I know how special Kansas is. I want you to do whatever you want. My attitude is not going to change toward you.’ And it never did. Coach and I still golfed. We still got together at the end of the summer. Nothing changed.”
And then everything changed for Williams when Al Bohl replaced Bob Frederick as KU’s athletic director.
“I’m hopeful the people will give coach Smith a warm reception,” Williams said. “He had almost nothing to do with it. When it came around again in 2003, he said, ‘Just remember, I’m with you whatever you do. I know you’ve been struggling, but remember, I’m with you whatever you want to do.'”
At Kansas, Williams reached four Final Fours and coached in two national title games, including a loss to Syracuse in his final game. His Tar Heels won the national title in his second year as head coach at the school where he assisted Smith for 10 seasons.
“I think the University of Kansas means a great deal to him,” Williams said of Smith. “He has been hurt by some things aimed at me, and by (ESPN GameDay announcer) Hubert Davis being booed a couple of weeks ago because he’s from North Carolina. Still, he loves the University of Kansas. He loves Lawrence. He loves what Doc Allen has meant to college basketball and he loves what the University of Kansas has done for Roy Williams. That doesn’t mean he hasn’t been bothered by things, intended and unintended, just like I have. It’s been really hard on me. That was 15 of the greatest years of my life.”
Williams related an anecdote about an exchange he had with a man who came up to him in an airport: “He looked at me and said, ‘I’m a Kansas fan.’ I said, ‘So am I.’ He started walking away. Then he turned around and said, ‘I just wish you had won a national championship at Kansas.’ I said, ‘So do I.’ He sat down for 10 or 15 minutes and then he came back to me and said, ‘I’ve been thinking. Those were stupid comments I made. You gave us everything you had for 15 years.’ I don’t think anyone was a bigger Kansas fan than I was for 15 years. I know that people will say they hated you leaving, they miss you, good positive things, but you know and I know, some of it has been harsh.”
Williams said he follows Kansas, which is 22-4, tied for first in the Big 12, and ranked ninth in the nation under fourth-year coach Bill Self, who uses three juniors, three sophomores and two freshmen in his eight-man rotation.
“Bill has done a nice job,” Williams said. “They’ve got a wonderful team, one of the best teams in the country. They are a joy to watch play. And I think I might be a good-luck charm for them. I saw zero of Texas A&M. I saw zero of DePaul. I saw zero of Oral Roberts. Every time I watch them play they win.”
Williams said he has not been to Lawrence in about a year-and-a-half.
“When I do I try to go in and out quietly,” Williams said. “I don’t want there to be anything that upsets me or anybody else. I know what the time (spent in Lawrence) has meant to me and will mean to me my entire life.”
Memories of ’57?
Were you at the 1957 national championship game to watch KU and North Carolina in Kansas City, Mo.? If so, we want to hear your stories.
Also, if you have mementos of any kind from that game, let us know, so we can make it part of our 50th-anniversary special coming next month in the Lawrence Journal-World and on KUSports.com.
If so, call Ryan Greene at (785) 832-6357 or e-mail to editor@kusports.com
