The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com
February 2, 2011
Duke University head coach Mike Krzyzewski and the University of Maryland head coach Gary Williams greet each other prior to the start of their teams' NCAA basketball game in Durham, North Carolina January 9, 2011. (Reuters)Fifteen years ago, in the left corner of Cole Field House, Ricky Price rose from the baseline and did in Maryland with a three-point dagger, a shot that very likely sent Duke to the NCAA tournament that season and sent the Blue Devils' bench into a state of pandemonium.
Except Mike Krzyzewski, who started to jump with glee before composing himself, walking toward Gary Williams at midcourt and shaking the hand of the coach who had suffered a wrenching loss. Afterward, Krzyzewski said he understood how big a game it was for both schools. "I could put myself in Gary's shoes at that moment and see myself in the same position," he said.
Still hate Duke?
Still reserve contempt instead of respect for Krzyzewski, whose kids nearly all graduate, whose program never smells of probation and whose only major crime is that he wins?
Eleven Final Fours, two fewer than Roy Williams and Tom Izzo combined. Four national championships, one more than Bob Knight, the coach for whom he played at Army in the late 1960s. In fact, Krzyzweski enters Comcast Center on Wednesday night 15 wins shy of Knight's 902, the record in major men's college basketball.
"When I go back to players that I coached over all the years that I coached, Mike is the best player that I ever coached to be able to go from what he was as a high school player to a college player for us at Army," Knight said. "He was a big scorer in high school but not a very good shooter. And yet, he came to us and became an extremely good guard, getting the ball to other people, controlling the ball. Not throwing it away. He was an exceptional defensive player.
"I think his ability to understand that when he started playing in college it was a different game is the key. He was required to play differently than in high school. Mike's ability to adjust to a different environment in college basketball is the key to his being the kind of coach he's been."
At 63, battling a legion of much younger coaches who often promise more than playing time to recruits, Krzyzewski is as old as he is contemporary.
"It's kind of incredible from my perspective," said Jay Bilas, who played on Krzyzewski's first national finalist team at Duke. "Think about it: The guy I had played for is still coaching at a game I'm analyzing [tomorrow] night.
"I hear people say, 'He's the same guy he always been.' He's not even close. He's so much better in every way. He's more engaged; he's got a reservoir of experience to draw from now."
The people who coached him and played for him agree his biggest strength is adapting to change.
"He treats every year as a new entity," Bilas added. "He doesn't look at this as a continuum.
"This year, he had a team that everyone thought was going to be good at the beginning. The moment [freshman sensation] Kyrie Irving went down, he realized and said pretty quickly, 'We can't be the team we envisioned being but we can still be very good.' And the team changed and grew."
In his spare time, Krzyzewski restored America's Olympic basketball pride, guiding Kobe Bryant, LeBron James and Dwyane Wade to gold in the 2008 Games.
Still hate Duke? Still castigate all things Coach K?
"I don't claim to understand it," Bilas said. "But I know it exists. The fact is Duke is so visible. Maybe some people just get tired of it."
Like Derek Jeter and the Yankees, Krzyzewski and Duke might be hard to embrace because they always win, eclipsing their rivals in the process.
But after all the pain and misery they cause other teams and towns, a grudging respect is won.
It's why when students storm the court, as they did last March during Maryland's pulsating victory over Duke to grab a share of the ACC title, Krzyzewski doesn't view such celebrations as juvenile.
In his mind, if dumping Duke is that important, it means he and his kids have done a pretty good job of keeping the program running at a very high level.
"I know the NCAA doesn't probably want to hear this, but when I came out of high school in 1982, I didn't choose a college - I chose a coach," Bilas said. "It came down to three guys: Jim Boeheim [at Syracuse], Lute Olson [at Iowa at the time] and Coach K. He had the least amount of success and track record among them back then. He was the only one where you weren't sure whether his program was going to make it or not.
"But I trusted him. Something about him made me trust him. I've known him now for 30 years. He's gone from being my coach and my mentor to also becoming a trusted friend."
Did we mention Krzyzewski turned down some $40 million from Jerry Buss to coach the Lakers, his latest NBA suitor? He didn't want to mess with happiness and the job he has held for the past three decades.
Still hate Duke? Is there something deep inside that makes one root against Coach K and everything he is about?
If it's elitism or imperiousness - in essence, cheering against private institutions that require a lot of money, good grades and/or genuine athletic talent to attend - that's reasonable when it's about identifying with an underdog. More often, it's about pure envy.
Unless the disdain can be chalked up to pure rivalry, it's near impossible to root against Krzyzewski. You might as well root against integrity, loyalty and almost unparalleled success.
You might as well root against teachers, soon-to-be senior citizens and, while you're at it, America, which he will coach again at the 2012 Olympics.
Still hate Duke and its basketball coach?
Everyone's entitled to an opinion, but I've heard the rancor and felt the rage, and I'm still left asking: What's to hate?
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