Dean Smith dies Saturday night at 83

Legendary North Carolina men’s basketball coach Dean Smith died on Saturday night in Chapel Hill, UNC announced this morning. He was 83.

“Coach Dean Smith passed away peacefully the evening of February 7 at his home in Chapel Hill, and surrounded by his wife and five children,” the Smith family said in a statement, according to UNC’s release.

“We are grateful for all the thoughts and prayers, and appreciate the continued respect for our privacy as arrangements are made available to the public. Thank you.”

Smith coached UNC from 1961 to 1997, leading the Tar Heels to national championships in 1982 and 1993, 13 ACC tournament titles and 11 Final Fours. He retired as the winningest coach in college basketball.

Perhaps more significant, though, was his social awareness and impact off the court. Smith was a champion of integration, and in 1966 recruited UNC’s first African-American scholarship athlete, Charlie Scott. Smith was willing to take a stand when others were not, to mold his players into better men, to learn and love. In 2013, President Barack Obama awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

“While Coach Smith couldn’t join us today due to an illness he is facing with extraordinary courage, we also honor his courage in helping to change our country,” said Obama in his opening remarks that day in 2013. “He recruited the first black scholarship athlete to North Carolina and helped integrate a restaurant and a neighborhood in Chapel Hill. That’s the kind of character he represented on and off the court.”

Former players and coaches are fiercely loyal to Smith.

“It’s such a great loss for North Carolina — our state, the University, of course the Tar Heel basketball program, but really the entire basketball world,” UNC Coach Roy Williams, who coached under Smith from 1978 to 1988, said in a statement.

“We lost one of our greatest ambassadors for college basketball for the way in which a program should be run. We lost a man of the highest integrity, who did so many things off the court to help make the world a better place to live in.”

Williams' full statement is below:

“It’s such a great loss for North Carolina – our state, the University, of course the Tar Heel basketball program, but really the entire basketball world. We lost one of our greatest ambassadors for college basketball for the way in which a program should be run. We lost a man of the highest integrity who did so many things off the court to help make the world a better place to live in.

He set the standard for loyalty and concern for every one of his players, not just the games won or lost.

He was the greatest there ever was on the court but far, far better off the court with people. His concern for people will be the legacy I will remember most.

He was a mentor to so many people; he was my mentor. He gave me a chance but, more importantly, he shared with me his knowledge, which is the greatest gift you can give someone.

I’m 64 years old and everything I do with our basketball program and the way I deal with the University is driven by my desire to make Coach Smith proud. When I came back to Carolina, the driving force was to make him proud and I still think that today.

I’d like to say on behalf of all our players and coaches, past and present, that Dean Smith was the perfect picture of what a college basketball coach should have been. We love him and we will miss him.”