University of North Carolina Athletics
Coach Guthridge At Peace With Himself
March 31, 2000 | Men's Basketball
March 31, 2000
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By David Droschak
AP Sports Writer
INDIANAPOLIS -- Bill Guthridge is an easy target, much like the quiet kid the school bully picks on.
When college basketball power North Carolina began losing games too frequently for the taste of its rabid alumni and fans, the unassuming coach who seldom stands during a game or yells publicly at his players was universally blamed.
After all, Guthridge is no Dean Smith, right?
ut Guthridge, Smith's right-hand man for 30 years before taking over for the coaching great three years ago, has his group of self-proclaimed underachievers in the Final Four for the second time.
True to his meek personality, Guthridge takes no personal pleasure in proving critics wrong.
"I feel good about myself and the team has responded well," Guthridge said Thursday of the job he has done this season.
"I don't listen to talk shows or get on the Internet. There is tremendous interest in North Carolina basketball and with that people have opinions on how things should be done."
This week has been far from mundane for the 62-year-old Guthridge. After winning the South Regional in Austin, Texas, he flew to Kansas to bury his mother Betty, who died of Alzheimer's disease at 96.
A day later, Guthridge was back at practice preparing a game plan for a pressing Florida team he'll face in the national semifinals Saturday night in the RCA Dome.
"It was a celebration of my mother's life," Guthridge said when asked about the funeral. "It was fine. There were a lot of friends around and a lot of good memories."
The Tar Heels (22-13) found out about the death of Guthridge's mother after reporters began asking them questions at the South Regional. The coach didn't want it to a distraction.
"I have seen a steady person this week," Forte said of Guthridge. "He has been to himself. I don't think he was bothered tremendously by his mother's death, but I'm sure he's been dealing with it in his own way. He has been the same person he has been all year."
Guthridge's team hasn't. The Tar Heels have reeled off four straight NCAA tournament wins after losing four of six heading into the postseason.
The Tar Heels admit part of the NCAA motivation has been for Guthridge, Smith's strong-arm assistant who ran with punished players at 6 a.m., but has gotten the reputation as being a soft head coach.
"We didn't want to be known as the team to bring down coach Gut," sophomore Jason Capel said. "We didn't want to be the team to bring down the program, to let down the Carolina tradition. We're going to do this thing, and we are going to do it for the tradition, the program and for the coach."
Capel, the son of Old Dominion head coach Jeff Capel, knows how brutal fans can be.
"Coaches get blamed for everything, and a lot of things they don't do," the younger Capel said. "Coach Gut got blamed for a lot of things that we were doing, and a lot of things we weren't doing, on the court and off the court. How can you not get down some when you were always a Top 25 team and then you're losing four in a row and not in the Top 25 anymore?"
Guthridge's 80 wins is tied with North Carolina State's Everett Case (1947-49) for the most by a coach after three seasons.
Capel said he hopes the program's 15th Final Four trip will silence the Guthridge detractors.
"He's been down some this year, but he never lets on," Capel said of Guthridge. "He always makes himself stay up to keep us up. He told us all year, 'I promise you, you're a great team.' It took us a long time to step up, but what a better time to do it - in the tournament."
© Copyright 2000 The Associated Press
