Here is a wonderful brief tribute to Deano from Mssrs. Tomlinson and Wolff. It’s very appropriate as well to add, and ask that you pray for that good Baptist Dean Smith, as he suffers now from dementia. I remember Dean well, and personally. You see I went to his basketball camp in Chapel Hill in the summer of 1967. I was coached by Eddie Fogler and Charlie Scott at the camp. At the time, I thought I might become a basketball player. But I never grew any more after the ninth grade. What did continue to grow was my admiration for Dean Smith who helped integrate basketball and the restaurants in Chapel Hill, and teach Sunday school. You would not hear him swearing a blue streak like you do famous coaches now. You would not hear him berating players, he himself would take the blame when there were mistakes. His priorities were just the opposite of most coaches today– the institution comes first, then the program, then the team, then the individual player… not the other way around. If more coaches lived by that list of priorities we would have a lot less academic fraud and probation of sports programs in America. There was only one Dean Smith, and he was a Christian man, a good man, and a fine coach. He has meant a lot to me, as he did to my Dad who was long ago a Carolina cheerleader in the 1930s.
espn.go.com/espn/feature/story/_/id/10545949/precious-memories-dean-smith-story
https://www.facebook.com/sharer/sharer.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fespn.go.com%2Fvideo%2Fclip%3Fid%3D10553589
Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In