Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, April 4, 1993 TAG: 9304040147
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Bill Brill
DATELINE: NEW ORLEANS LENGTH: Medium
CALENDAR HELPED WILLIAMS BIDE HIS TIME
When Roy Williams was a ninth- or 10th-grader in high school in Asheville, N.C., he decided he wanted to be a basketball coach.Under today's rules, he might be selling golf equipment now.
The Kansas coach graduated from North Carolina in 1972, got his master's degree the next year, and immediately got a coaching opportunity at Swannanoa Owen High near his hometown at the tender age of 23.
Five years later, Williams got an opportunity to return to his alma mater, and Dean Smith, as the part-time coach.
It was a financial gamble. "I was making $16,000 coaching in high school and I went to Carolina for $2,500," Williams said.
His wife, Wanda, was teaching school, but it was pretty obvious the family, with one child and another on the way, needed additional revenue.
In today's circumstances, Williams would have been the restricted-earnings coach. The limitations placed on that coach, especially in the summer, might have precluded Williams from continuing in the profession. As it was, he worked at Carolina for 10 years and never was a full-time assistant.
Williams made his money doing odd jobs. He delivered television tapes all over the state, but his big bucks eventually came from selling basketball calendars.
"Nobody had done it before [at Carolina]," he said. "I started it. My wife and children wanted to eat."
So Williams created a poster that had pictures of the Carolina players, the schedule, "and anything else we could put on it."
He said he got the idea from Rick Robey, who did the same thing when he was a player at Kentucky in 1978. "The way they did it was illegal," Williams said. Naturally, that was the first thing he and Smith got straightened out.
The first year, Williams spent 10 weeks on the road, drove 10,000 miles, and sold 9,000 calendars. "I'd go see a customer, get on my knees and ask him to buy 100 calendars. Then I'd put the name of his company across the bottom."
By the time he finished his career as a poster-pusher, "I'd spent five weeks on the road, drove 5,000 miles and sold 53,000 calendars. Obviously, I got a lot better at it."
What Williams did was not all that unusual. The third assistant could not make a living wage, and he had to scramble to support a family. He doesn't know what would have happened had the current rules been in effect when he started 14 years ago.
"I doubt if I could have lasted as long as I did in the one job," he said.
Williams jumped from Carolina to head coach at Kansas, where he produced two Final Four teams in five years.
The next Roy Williams may be out there somewhere as a restricted-earnings coach. His salary is limited to $12,000 and, more important, he can make no more than $4,000 during the summer.
Coaches want that changed. So does NCAA executive director Dick Schultz, who believes it will be voted out in the 1994 NCAA convention. In the meantime, nobody knows what is going to happen this summer.
Last year, when the restricted-earnings designation went into effect, the coaches were compensated before Aug. 1 so that they didn't lose any money. That can't happen this year.
"The executive council will discuss it when it meets," Schultz said. "This needs to be cleaned up because coaches have to play all kinds of games [to make money]."
Schultz said he favored "allowing the coach to have unlimited income in the summer as long as he has the support of the university." However, that won't help this summer unless the Division I members of the council elected to lift the ban for this summer. They could do that, but it would have to be considered a non-controversial issue.
But, as Schultz said, "That might be a bit of a stretch."
If nothing happens, maybe the next Roy Williams will have to quit to make a living - perhaps by selling calendars.