
DATE: Thursday, March 13, 1997              TAG: 9703130573

SECTION: SPORTS                  PAGE: C1   EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: Column 

SOURCE: Tom Robinson 

                                            LENGTH:   90 lines

HELPING A COACH BECOMEA DEAN

Dean Smith had won only 50 games as North Carolina's basketball coach when Larry Miller took the court for the first time as a Tar Heel.

Smith had moved from assistant to head coach when Frank McGuire left in 1961. By the end of his fourth season, Smith had been hanged in effigy. His Tar Heels had won no ACC championships. They had not played in the postseason. They were going nowhere, it seemed. .

Who could have dreamed that in 1997 Smith would still be coaching at North Carolina, in an arena that bears his name? That Smith would have 875 career victories, one shy of the all-time record held by Kentucky's Adolph Rupp? And that the huge changes in talent, NCAA rules and on the social landscape wouldn't have dispatched Smith, now 66, to some pasture?

Certainly not Miller, who as a sophomore in 1965 - freshmen couldn't play in those days - was eager to do his part to help Smith, shall we say, improve his image around Chapel Hill.

``Now, players have the benefit of knowing, from player to player, what to expect, but back then there wasn't much passed over to us,'' says Miller, 50, who played with the Virginia Squires of the ABA and settled in Virginia Beach. ``There was really no history of coach Smith. He didn't have much of a track record.''

He did by the time Miller left. Led by Bob Lewis and Miller, a lefthanded forward who became one of UNC's all-time greats, the Tar Heels reclaimed their weighty reputation from the late 1950s and kick-started Smith down the path to glory.

From 1965 to 1968, North Carolina won 70 games, one shy of the most wins accumulated over three seasons, to that point, by UNC from 1944 to 1947. With Miller as a two-time All-American and ACC player of the year, the Tar Heels twice won the ACC regular season and the tournament, reached the NCAA's Final Four twice and the title game once.

The Heels lost 78-55 in '68 to UCLA in Miller's final game. But the trumpets had sounded for the kingdom that Smith rules today. Since '66-67, no college program has won more games than UNC. And for Miller, nothing he has done since, including his seven years in the ABA, tops being there when the light pierced the clouds.

``Obviously, going to North Carolina was a decision that was paramount for me, to be a part of this thing,'' says Miller, who works in real estate. ``Really, you couldn't write a better script.''

Miller was one of Smith's finest scorers, averaging 22 points per game, which ranks fifth all-time at North Carolina. Then, as now, 20-point averages were rare in Smith's spread-the-wealth system.

According to Miller, who often sees his old coach, most everything about Smith is the same - the discipline within his program, his innovation, his impeccable instruction, his organization, his ultra-competitiveness, all still sharp after 36 seasons.

``He had the same values then as he has now that I can see,'' Miller says. ``Every player's loved him who ever played for him. He's loyal to the manager and the 12th player to the top player. There's no caste system. You just have to admire what he does.''

And all this stuff about Smith genuinely despising any conversation about Rupp's record? All true, Miller says. Smith unfailingly deflects praise, which is why Miller isn't sure how he'll acknowledge No. 877 when it comes, if he congratulates Smith at all.

``I know how he feels about those things,'' Miller says. ``It wouldn't be important to him.''

What is important, Miller says, is Smith's final product and the process he takes to get there.

``What would he do if he didn't do this?,'' Miller says. ``He can't play golf every day. I think he's motivated not by wins but by what he does. He has these competitive juices.

``There are always these big hitters coming into the league trying to dethrone him, but Dean's withstood them all these years. He likes the challenges. I'm guessing that's what keeps him going.''

And this year, Smith's road to a national title is loaded with cosmic possibilities, Miller notes. The record-breaking victory could come against Indiana's notorious Bob Knight, who has 700 wins of his own.

Then Smith might have to beat two proteges, Eddie Fogler of South Carolina and Roy Williams of Kansas, to reach the final. There, the opponent could be Kentucky - where Rupp made his legend.

``That's a storyline that would be unbelievable,'' Miller says. ``For that to happen, it would be mystical.

If I were him, I might retire right there.'' ILLUSTRATION: [Color photo]

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Dean Smith wasn't an instant success at UNC. Today, however, he is

one win shy of Adolph Rupp's all-time victory mark.

[Photo]

Larry Miller, who now lives in Virginia Beach, joined the Tar Heels

in 1955.