A timeline of Roy Williams’ coaching career. He was the fastest to win 900 games
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The end of an era: Roy Williams announces retirement
Read more coverage about Roy Williams’ retirement as coach of the UNC men’s basketball team.
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UNC men’s basketball coach Roy Williams, a 1972 North Carolina graduate, retired April 1, surprising the college basketball world.
Here’s a look at some of the highlights of his long career.
1973: High school coach
Williams, 23 at the time, was named head basketball coach at Owen High School in Black Mountain, N.C. He earned his master’s degree that year and spent several summers in Chapel Hill working at Dean Smith’s basketball camps. When he became a high school head coach, he modeled his program after Smith’s. Williams’ first team won two games.
1978: Working for Dean Smith
Williams took a part-time job as an assistant at UNC. One of his jobs was to deliver videotape of Smith’s weekly TV shows to stations in Greensboro and Asheville. The job paid less than $3,000 per year.
Nov. 25, 1988: First victory
Williams begins his head coaching career at Kansas with a 94-81 win over Alaska-Anchorage. The Jayhawks finished the 1988-89 season at 19-12. That would be the only season that a Williams-led Kansas team would not win 20 games.
Williams coached at Kansas for 15 years. His Jayhawks went 418-101 with four Final Four appearances and nine conference championships before he left for North Carolina.
March 16, 1990: Early madness
Kansas beats Robert Morris 79-71 to get Williams his first NCAA tournament win. Williams would win 77.6% of his NCAA tournament games in his 33-year career. Williams’ teams only lost one first-round game in 30 tries, this year to Wisconsin.
March 30, 1991: First Final Four
Kansas beats North Carolina 79-73 in the Final Four, as Williams beats his mentor, Smith. Williams coached in eight more Final Fours and won three national titles.
April 15, 2003: Roy comes home
After turning down the UNC job years earlier, Williams, then 52, decided to leave Kansas and come home two weeks after coach Matt Doherty was forced to resign. Williams signed an eight-year contract worth $260,000 annually with a $25,000 annual expense account plus a $21,667 bonus for reaching the NCAA tournament.
Nov. 22, 2003: First win as a Tar Heel
UNC beats Old Dominion 90-64 and Williams gets his first win as head coach of the Tar Heels.
April 4, 2005: Title returns to Chapel Hill
Sean May scored 26 points, grabbed 10 rebounds and earned tournament MVP as Williams’ Tar Heels beat Illinois, 75-70, in the NCAA championship game. It was North Carolina’s first national title in 12 years, and its first since Smith retired. Williams won his first of three national championships.
Dec. 9, 2006: Milestone
Williams became the fastest coach to win 500 games. The Tar Heels beat High Point, 94-69.
Sept. 7, 2007: Hall of Fame coach
Williams was elected into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of fame, in a class that included NBA world championship coach Phil Jackson.
April 6, 2009: A champion, again ...
UNC whips Michigan State 98-72 to win Williams’ second national championship. Led by Tyler Hansbrough, Wayne Ellington and Ty Lawson, the Tar Heels won the school’s fifth national title in dominant fashion. UNC won every tournament game by double digits and outscored opponents by 121 points total during March Madness.
April 4, 2017: ... And again
UNC beats Gonzaga 71-65 to win Williams’ third national title at UNC. It came one year after the Tar Heels lost the national championship to Villanova on Kris Jenkins’ buzzer-beater. The Tar Heels finished 33-7.
Feb. 24, 2021: Win 900
UNC beats Florida State 78-70 and Williams becomes the fastest coach in NCAA history, and only the fourth all time, to win 900 games. Williams needed 1,161 games to get to 900, faster than Duke’s Mike Krzyzewski (1,183), Syracuse’s Jim Boeheim (1,251) and former Indiana coach Bob Knight (1,269).
April 1, 2021: Retirement
At age 70, Williams ends his 33-year career. The most famous Tar Heel of them of all, Charlotte Hornets owner Michael Jordan, told The Charlotte Observer: Williams is getting “to choose (his) own path, to walk away from the game when he wants.”
Williams ended his tenure at UNC with a record of 485-163. With 903 career wins, Williams has the sixth-highest winning percentage (.774) in NCAA history.
This story was originally published April 1, 2021 at 3:20 PM with the headline "A timeline of Roy Williams’ coaching career. He was the fastest to win 900 games."
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