1953, North Carolina split from the Southern Conference and became a founding member of the

Atlantic Coast Conference.[23] The Tar Heels won their first NCAA Championship in 1957 under fifth
year head coach Frank McGuire, who led an undefeated 32-0 squad dominated by Lennie
Rosenbluth and several other transplants from the New York City area to a 54-53 triple overtime
victory over Wilt Chamberlain's Kansas Jayhawks. C.D. Chesley, a Washington, D.C. television
producer, piped the 1957 championship game in Kansas City to a hastily created network of five
stations across North Carolina—the ancestor to the current syndicated ACC football and basketball
package from Raycom Sports—which helped prove pivotal in basketball becoming a craze in the
state.[24] The title game was the only triple overtime final game in championship history,[25] which
followed a triple overtime North Carolina defeat of Michigan State 74-70 the previous night.

In 1960, the Tar Heels were placed on NCAA probation for "improper recruiting entertainment" of
basketball prospects. As a result, they were barred from the 1961 NCAA tournament[26] and also
withdrew from the 1961 ACC Tournament. Following the season, Chancellor William Aycock forced
McGuire to resign. As a replacement, Aycock selected one of McGuire's assistants, Kansas alumnus
Dean Smith.

Dean Smith (1961–1997)

Larry Miller led UNC to Final Four appearances in 1967 and 1968.
Smith's early teams were not nearly as successful as McGuire's had been. His first team went only 8–
9 as it turned out, the last losing season UNC would suffer for 40 years. His first five teams never
won more than 16 games. This grated on a fan base used to winning; in 1965 some of them even
hanged him in effigy. However, Smith would go on to take the Tar Heels to a reign of championships
and national dominance.[27] When he retired in 1997, Smith's 879 wins were the most ever for any
NCAA Division I men's basketball coach, and his 77.61% winning percentage ninth best.[28] During
his tenure, North Carolina won or shared 17 ACC regular season titles and won 13 ACC Tournaments.
They went to the NCAA tournament 27 times–including 23 in a row from 1975 to 1997–appeared in
11 Final Fours, and won NCAA national tournament titles in 1982 and 1993. They also won the NIT in
1971.[29] The 1982 National Championship team was led by James Worthy, Sam Perkins, and a
young Michael Jordan.[30] The 1993 National Championship team starred
VMatt Doherty (2000–2003)
Guthridge retired in 2000 and North Carolina turned to Matt Doherty, the head coach at Notre Dame
and a player on the 1982 championship team, to lead the Tar Heels.[35] Doherty had little success
while at North Carolina. In his first season, the Heels were ranked #1 in the polls in the middle of the
Atlantic Coast Conference schedule and finished with a 26–7 record. The bottom fell out the
following year, as the Tar Heels finished the season with a record of 8–20, the worst season in school
history. They missed postseason play entirely for the first time since the 1965–66 season (including a
record 27 straight NCAA Tournament appearances) and finished with a losing record for the first time
since 1962 (Dean Smith's first year as coach). They also finished 4–12 in the ACC—only the
program's second losing ACC record ever. The 12 losses were six more than the Tar Heels had ever
suffered in a single season of ACC play, and placed them in a tie for 7th place—the program's first
finish below fourth place ever. The season also saw the end of UNC's run of 31 straight 20-win
seasons and 35 straight seasons of finishing third or higher in the ACC.

After bringing in one of the top 5 incoming classes for the 2002–2003 season, the Tar Heels started
the season by knocking off a top 5 Kansas team and going on to win the Preseason NIT and returning
to the AP top 25. North Carolina went on to finish the season 17–15, but a 6–10 record in ACC play
kept them out of the NCAA Tournament. Doherty led the Tar Heels to the third round of the NIT,
where they ended their season with a loss to Georgetown.

Roy Williams (2003–present)

Despite the turnaround from the year before and the NIT appearance, at the end of the season Matt
Doherty was replaced as head coach by Roy Williams. Williams had served as an assistant to Smith
for 11 years before leaving to spend the first 15 years of his Hall of Fame head coaching career
leading Kansas to 9 conference regular season championships and four Final Fours before Smith
convinced him to return home. It was hoped that Williams would restore a measure of stability to the
program. Williams was UNC's third coach in six years. The two previous to Guthridge (McGuire and
Smith) had covered a 45-year period.

Tyler Hansbrough became the ACC's all-time leading scorer in 2009.

In Williams' first season, the Tar Heels finished 19–11 and were ranked in a final media poll for the
first time in three years. They returned to the NCAA tournament and were ousted in the second round
by Texas. The following year, the Tar Heels won their fourth NCAA title and Williams' first as a head
coach.[36] After winning the championship, Williams lost his top seven scorers, but the 2005–06
season saw the arrival of freshman Tyler Hansbrough and Williams was named Coach of the Year.
The Tar Heels swept the ACC regular season and tournament titles in 2007 and 2008. The 2008 ACC
Tournament was the first time North Carolina has ever won the ACC Tournament without defeating at
least one in-state rival during the tournament.[37] North Carolina lost in the national semifinals of the
2008 NCAA tournament to Williams' former program Kansas.

In the 2008–09 season, the Tar Heels won their fifth NCAA title by defeating Michigan State in the
championship of the 2009 NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament.[38] The Tar Heels won all six of
that year's tournament games by at least 12 points, for an average victory margin of 20.2 points, and
only trailed for a total of 10 minutes out of 240 through the entire tournament.[39] Wayne Ellington
was named the tournament's