UNC Basketball: Roy Williams talks FBI investigation, NCAA scandal

North Carolina head coach Roy Williams ‘stunned’ by FBI investigation, findings.

Amid a federal investigation that’s left the college basketball world reeling, North Carolina head coach Roy Williams sat down with ESPN’s John Goodman to discuss the impact of the three-year probe involving illegal dealings with shoe companies that’s led to 10 arrests and multiple firings.

“They’ve never helped me get any player, never insinuated, never done anything,” Williams told Goodman in an exclusive interview on Monday. “I’ve dealt with Nike and Jordan Brand since I came back here, but we never even discuss things like that. So I know it’s foreign to me.”

The FBI investigation, which alleges mass corruption, bribery and wire fraud involving some of college basketball’s top programs, has already resulted in the termination of numerous coaches and the indictment of many others involved.

Williams, who stated that he hadn’t followed the specifics of the scandal closely, said that he was “stunned” when he first heard about the FBI’s investigation and the subsequent arrests of multiple assistant coaches.

Auburn assistant Chuck Person, Southern California assistant Tony Bland, Arizona assistant Emanuel Richardson and Oklahoma State assistant Lamont Evans were the first four coaches named in the FBI’s investigation.

Just a day later, University of Louisville head coach Rick Pitino became the topic of conversation when he was put on administrative leave, effectively ending his tenure at the school. His termination became official on Monday when the university’s athletic association voted unanimously to part ways with the Hall-of-Fame coach altogether.

Williams told Goodman that it’s unfair to “paint the entire college basketball world like this”, noting that there are a lot of “tremendous people” coaching in college basketball.

Goodman asked Williams what he thought would come of the federal investigation and what impact it might have on the future of college basketball.

“I think we have to wait and see,” Williams said. “I think you have to go through the process and see what was actually done and then make corrections. … I just don’t understand the whole trail there. So those people are doing the investigating and it’s their job to find out what happened.”

The three-time NCAA champion coach is no stranger to adversity, having faced NCAA allegations and investigation for the last several years. To this point, though, Williams himself has gone unnamed in any of the notices of allegations released by the NCAA.

And while North Carolina has its own NCAA issues involving academic fraud to deal with, they have not been named in the FBI’s ongoing investigation.