Dean Smith died the other day. He coached basketball for 36 years at the University of North Carolina from 1961 until 1997. Without doubt, he one of the best college basketball coaches of all time. I attended UNC from 1966 until 1970 and got to witness his early successes. His teams went the Final Four round of the NCAA basketball tournament three years straight in 1967-69.
Smith's overall record was 879 wins and 254 losses. Teams he coached won two NCAA Championships, and he also coached the US Olympic Basketball Team to win the 1976 Olympics. He and Bobby Knight are the only college basketball coaches to both play on and coach NCAA championship teams. (I've borrowed heavily from Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dean_Smith for all this.)
His teams generally featured a fast-break style, a half-court offense that strongly emphasized the passing game, and an aggressive trapping defense that produced turnovers and easy baskets. From 1970 until his retirement, his teams shot over 50% from the floor in all but four years. Smith was credited with creating or popularizing the following basketball techniques:
- The "tired signal" in which a player would use a hand signal to indicate that he needed to come out for a rest. He generally had a deep bench of talented players, so he could afford this tactic to wear down an opponent.
- Huddling at the free throw line before a foul shot
- Encouraging players who scored a basket to point a finger at the teammate who passed them the ball
- Using a variety of defensive sets in one game, including the point zone, the run-and-jump, and double-teaming the screen-and-roll
- Having the point guard call out the defense sets for the team. Smith was a point guard in his playing days, and always seemed to find point guards who were like his assistant coach on the court.
- Smith was most associated with his implementation of the four corners offense, a strategy for stalling with a lead near the end of the game. Smith's teams executed the four corners set so effectively that by 1985 the NCAA instituted a shot clock to speed up play and minimize ball-control offense.
- Smith was also the author of Basketball: Multiple Offense and Defense, the best-selling technical basketball book in history.
- Smith also instituted the practice of starting all his team's seniors on the last home game of the season ("Senior Day") as a way of recognizing and honoring the contributions of the subs as well as the stars. If the team included six seniors, he put all six on the floor at the beginning of the game – drawing a technical foul – rather than leave one of them out.
- 96.6% of his players graduated college
Needless to say, he was loved by his fans and his players.
