03-30-2005, 10:47 AM
Published: Mar 30, 2005
Modified: Mar 30, 2005 7:03 AM
Wojcik facing his guys
Former UNC assistant will help MSU try to beat Tar Heels he recruited
Doug Wojcik, center, talks with Matt Doherty, left, on the UNC bench in 2001. Other assistants are Bob MacKinnon, second from left, and Fred Quartlebaum.
Staff File Photo by Scott Sharpe
By LUCIANA CHAVEZ, Staff Writer
AUSTIN, TEXAS -- Michigan State coach Tom Izzo has been saying the same thing to associate head coach Doug Wojcik all season.
From afar, Izzo and Wojcik, a former North Carolina assistant, have watched the Tar Heels win the ACC regular-season title, earn a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament and then a trip to the NCAA Final Four. All along, Izzo has said to Wojcik, "Those are your guys."
Wojcik helped recruit Jawad Williams, Jackie Manuel, Melvin Scott, Sean May, Raymond Felton and Rashad McCants to UNC while working as Matt Doherty's lead assistant from 2000-03.
Wojcik's prize recruits will be his foes when the Spartans face the Tar Heels in the Final Four in St. Louis Saturday at approximately 9 p.m.
"I'll have chills. It'll be awesome," said Wojcik, 40.
The good times have been truly good to Wojcik since he left UNC. Wojcik will take over as the head coach at Tulsa after the Final Four.
Ask Wojcik what he thinks about the trick of fate that has his current team facing his old team and he laughs in one breath, shakes his head the next, then goes sober in the third.
"What a turn of events," he said. "The fact that we're playing them, it'll be weird but really very satisfying for me. "
Wojcik still speaks to the UNC players -- most often with May and Felton -- he helped lure to Chapel Hill with Doherty and former UNC assistant Fred Quartlebaum. May called him March 15, the day after Wojcik took the Tulsa job.
"He has a great head coaching job," May said. "I told him it was long overdue. He deserved it a long time ago."
Wojcik, a West Virginia native, cut his own path through the basketball world as a Naval Academy teammate of David Robinson with whom he led the Midshipmen to three straight NCAA Tournament appearances in the mid-1980s.
He was an assistant at Navy for nine years before hooking up with Doherty for their one season at Notre Dame in 1999-2000. After current UNC coach Roy Williams declined the Carolina job in 2000, Doherty took the job and brought his Notre Dame staff -- with no UNC graduates among them save himself -- to Chapel Hill.
There Wojcik coordinated the effort to bring in the recruiting classes of the current Carolina seniors and juniors that are significant reasons why the Heels are in the Final Four now.
"It's going to be awkward, seeing him coaching on the other sideline, knowing he was the guy that used to be in my house when I was in high school, recruiting me," said Felton, who spoke to Wojcik on Monday. "It's going to feel funny, but he knows it's all about business at this point, and when you get on the court, there are no friends. ... But he knows it's all love, no matter what."
Two years ago -- the first year at UNC for May, Felton and McCants -- things were not close to being that peachy in Chapel Hill. The Heels had gone 8-20 in 2002 and then finished 19-16 in 2003. After the 2003 season, players met with athletics director Dick Baddour. Doberty was fired and his staff, including Wojcik, sent adrift.
"In a way, it goes to show you that you meet the same people going up as coming down the ladder," Wojcik said. "One day you're an assistant at North Carolina, arguably the best college program in the country, and the next day you're unemployed. In my opinion, it had nothing to do with my work ethic or what I did there."
Wojcik didn't want to rehash the past but said things happen for a reason.
"It was one of those things; there were powers that be that happened at UNC; I've tried to take a positive approach to the whole thing," he said. "Things happen for a reason. It was very unfortunate what happened at Carolina and [my family] was sad when we left. We still talk about Chapel Hill but not like we used to. We talk about Spartan basketball and my boys know the Michigan State fight song."
He does speak with Doherty. They spoke on Monday, with Doherty offering congratulations.
"We had a direct feed in our CSTV studios [where Doherty works] and I got to see him cut down the net while holding his son, Paxson," Doherty said. "That was great to see but it was kind of ironic."
Doherty said Tuesday that he didn't discuss the Tulsa job with Wojcik at length. That Wojcik will now be a head coach and Doherty isn't at the moment is also ironic. Doherty has not coached since leaving UNC and turned down the James Madison job in March 2004. He also interviewed with St. John's but did not get the job, which went to Norm Roberts. Doherty's name was mentioned in the Tulsa search but he removed himself from consideration on March 11. Wojcik accepted the job on March 14.
"We didn't talk about that -- it was more about what a ride it has been for him, how a lot of people had [Michigan State] counted out," Doherty said.
The UNC players Wojcik helped recruit still hold a soft spot for him. McCants said Wojcik was his favorite.
"[Coach Wojcik] wanted to bring the best player out of you," McCants said. "He believed in my talent, ability and passion for the game."
Though Wojcik wasn't a key in May's recruitment, May echoed McCants' sentiment.
"Once I got here, he became my go-to guy," May said. "Whatever problem I had, if I just needed someone to talk to about life, I went to coach Wojcik."
In another week, Wojcik will be headed to Tulsa, which has a reputation for churning out high-major coaches like Kentucky's Tubby Smith, Kansas' Bill Self and former Tennessee coach Buzz Peterson, who played with Doherty at UNC.
But, discussing the Tulsa job, Izzo told Wojcik how lucky he was for having gone through the wringer at Carolina, that Wojcik experienced something there that few coaches ever do.
"Few people know what it's like to be involved with a place like that," Wojcik said. "I mean Notre Dame is one thing and UNC is something else."
Come Saturday, Wojcik will be working against Tar Heel mania instead of for it. Michigan State assistant Mike Montgomery said Wojcik was emotional for the Spartans' win over Duke on Friday, so the UNC game will be crazy for him.
"Doug has a little extra incentive to beat UNC, let's just say that," Montgomery said. "But we're going to have his back."
May said facing Wojcik on such a huge stage will be difficult.
"For me it'll be tough," May said. "I'll try not to look to that sideline until after the game. Whichever way it goes. I'm going to go over and give him a hug and wish him the best."
Staff writer Luciana Chavez can be reached at 829-4864 or lchavez@newsobserver.com
Modified: Mar 30, 2005 7:03 AM
Wojcik facing his guys
Former UNC assistant will help MSU try to beat Tar Heels he recruited
Doug Wojcik, center, talks with Matt Doherty, left, on the UNC bench in 2001. Other assistants are Bob MacKinnon, second from left, and Fred Quartlebaum.
Staff File Photo by Scott Sharpe
By LUCIANA CHAVEZ, Staff Writer
AUSTIN, TEXAS -- Michigan State coach Tom Izzo has been saying the same thing to associate head coach Doug Wojcik all season.
From afar, Izzo and Wojcik, a former North Carolina assistant, have watched the Tar Heels win the ACC regular-season title, earn a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament and then a trip to the NCAA Final Four. All along, Izzo has said to Wojcik, "Those are your guys."
Wojcik helped recruit Jawad Williams, Jackie Manuel, Melvin Scott, Sean May, Raymond Felton and Rashad McCants to UNC while working as Matt Doherty's lead assistant from 2000-03.
Wojcik's prize recruits will be his foes when the Spartans face the Tar Heels in the Final Four in St. Louis Saturday at approximately 9 p.m.
"I'll have chills. It'll be awesome," said Wojcik, 40.
The good times have been truly good to Wojcik since he left UNC. Wojcik will take over as the head coach at Tulsa after the Final Four.
Ask Wojcik what he thinks about the trick of fate that has his current team facing his old team and he laughs in one breath, shakes his head the next, then goes sober in the third.
"What a turn of events," he said. "The fact that we're playing them, it'll be weird but really very satisfying for me. "
Wojcik still speaks to the UNC players -- most often with May and Felton -- he helped lure to Chapel Hill with Doherty and former UNC assistant Fred Quartlebaum. May called him March 15, the day after Wojcik took the Tulsa job.
"He has a great head coaching job," May said. "I told him it was long overdue. He deserved it a long time ago."
Wojcik, a West Virginia native, cut his own path through the basketball world as a Naval Academy teammate of David Robinson with whom he led the Midshipmen to three straight NCAA Tournament appearances in the mid-1980s.
He was an assistant at Navy for nine years before hooking up with Doherty for their one season at Notre Dame in 1999-2000. After current UNC coach Roy Williams declined the Carolina job in 2000, Doherty took the job and brought his Notre Dame staff -- with no UNC graduates among them save himself -- to Chapel Hill.
There Wojcik coordinated the effort to bring in the recruiting classes of the current Carolina seniors and juniors that are significant reasons why the Heels are in the Final Four now.
"It's going to be awkward, seeing him coaching on the other sideline, knowing he was the guy that used to be in my house when I was in high school, recruiting me," said Felton, who spoke to Wojcik on Monday. "It's going to feel funny, but he knows it's all about business at this point, and when you get on the court, there are no friends. ... But he knows it's all love, no matter what."
Two years ago -- the first year at UNC for May, Felton and McCants -- things were not close to being that peachy in Chapel Hill. The Heels had gone 8-20 in 2002 and then finished 19-16 in 2003. After the 2003 season, players met with athletics director Dick Baddour. Doberty was fired and his staff, including Wojcik, sent adrift.
"In a way, it goes to show you that you meet the same people going up as coming down the ladder," Wojcik said. "One day you're an assistant at North Carolina, arguably the best college program in the country, and the next day you're unemployed. In my opinion, it had nothing to do with my work ethic or what I did there."
Wojcik didn't want to rehash the past but said things happen for a reason.
"It was one of those things; there were powers that be that happened at UNC; I've tried to take a positive approach to the whole thing," he said. "Things happen for a reason. It was very unfortunate what happened at Carolina and [my family] was sad when we left. We still talk about Chapel Hill but not like we used to. We talk about Spartan basketball and my boys know the Michigan State fight song."
He does speak with Doherty. They spoke on Monday, with Doherty offering congratulations.
"We had a direct feed in our CSTV studios [where Doherty works] and I got to see him cut down the net while holding his son, Paxson," Doherty said. "That was great to see but it was kind of ironic."
Doherty said Tuesday that he didn't discuss the Tulsa job with Wojcik at length. That Wojcik will now be a head coach and Doherty isn't at the moment is also ironic. Doherty has not coached since leaving UNC and turned down the James Madison job in March 2004. He also interviewed with St. John's but did not get the job, which went to Norm Roberts. Doherty's name was mentioned in the Tulsa search but he removed himself from consideration on March 11. Wojcik accepted the job on March 14.
"We didn't talk about that -- it was more about what a ride it has been for him, how a lot of people had [Michigan State] counted out," Doherty said.
The UNC players Wojcik helped recruit still hold a soft spot for him. McCants said Wojcik was his favorite.
"[Coach Wojcik] wanted to bring the best player out of you," McCants said. "He believed in my talent, ability and passion for the game."
Though Wojcik wasn't a key in May's recruitment, May echoed McCants' sentiment.
"Once I got here, he became my go-to guy," May said. "Whatever problem I had, if I just needed someone to talk to about life, I went to coach Wojcik."
In another week, Wojcik will be headed to Tulsa, which has a reputation for churning out high-major coaches like Kentucky's Tubby Smith, Kansas' Bill Self and former Tennessee coach Buzz Peterson, who played with Doherty at UNC.
But, discussing the Tulsa job, Izzo told Wojcik how lucky he was for having gone through the wringer at Carolina, that Wojcik experienced something there that few coaches ever do.
"Few people know what it's like to be involved with a place like that," Wojcik said. "I mean Notre Dame is one thing and UNC is something else."
Come Saturday, Wojcik will be working against Tar Heel mania instead of for it. Michigan State assistant Mike Montgomery said Wojcik was emotional for the Spartans' win over Duke on Friday, so the UNC game will be crazy for him.
"Doug has a little extra incentive to beat UNC, let's just say that," Montgomery said. "But we're going to have his back."
May said facing Wojcik on such a huge stage will be difficult.
"For me it'll be tough," May said. "I'll try not to look to that sideline until after the game. Whichever way it goes. I'm going to go over and give him a hug and wish him the best."
Staff writer Luciana Chavez can be reached at 829-4864 or lchavez@newsobserver.com
