Matt Doherty--peace to you

During the early 80's, Matt Doherty was one of my favorite players. He always played in a supporting role for our program, usually the 3rd or 4th offensive weapon of Coach Smith's arsenal. He always seemed to be on the court at crucial junctures of the game, and I cannot remember Matt ever causing the Heels to lose a game...as a player.

That being said, I never believed that Doherty should have been hired in the summer of 2000 as the replacement of Coach Gut. His resume was too thin for my liking, having only served 1 year as a head coach of a Division I team. Although that's one more year than Dean Smith had when he took over the program in 1961, the game had changed immensely in those 39 years. For instance, Dean only had 1 assistant coach his first year.

Matt's first problem was relieving Hanners, Sullivan, and Ford from their duties as coaches of the program. I fully support Matt's decision in taking his assistants from ND with him--he was entitled to do so. The one I blame is Baddour. Baddour should have never hired a head coach that would not have, at a minimum, retained Phil Ford as an assistant. Phil had been an assistant for 12 years, and to have sent him packing was wrong (even if they just shuffled him within the university).

Matt didn't have a lot of talent at the program in 2001, but he did the best he could with what he had. Remember, Phil had Lang, Capel, Owens, Haywood, Curry, Peppers, and Forte as his main contributers to the team (Curry and Peppers were better football players than basketball players). However, after losing a few games at the beginning of the season, he had UNC ranked #1 shortly after upseting Duke at Cameron Indoor Stadium. I vividly remember the Heels having a section of students saying they were "Doh's Disciples".

The 2001-02 season was a train wreck. Haywood graduated, Curry and Peppers decided to only play football, and the new freshmen that year (Jawad Williams, Scott, and Manuel) were thrust into roles they were not ready to handle. Doh's patience wore thin, and the next thing you know some of his fringe players (Boone, Morrison) left the program.

Doh promised the 2002-03 season would be better, and it definitely was better. We beat UConn and Duke that year, and we even pulled an upset against Kansas. Unfortunately, practices were more painful with the program, and there were more freshmen (Saunders, Grant, May, McCants, and Felton) that had to go into action without being fully seasoned.

There are many issues that Matt created by himself. Obviously the players were in rebellion, and Matt's personality clashed with his players. But if it wasn't for Matt, would the 2004-05 UNC team won the National Championship?

So Matt Doherty, I know you will never read this post, but I do appreciate your role in UNC basketball. You were a splendid player, and you were an excellent recruiter. You were a good coach during the games, much better than I thought you would be when you were first hired. You had your faults, which only makes yourself human. I wished you would have knocked Chrissy Collins down when he confronted you at a UNC-Duke game, but that's okay too. I know you feel animosity towards our program, but I only hope you will forgive those who you believed on you.