Legendary Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski mourns Bobby Knight’s death: ‘He was one of a kind’

Long before Mike Krzyzewski grew into college basketball’s all-time leader in coaching wins, he was a skinny point guard from Chicago going through his college choices.

Bobby Knight, with considerable influence from Krzyzewski’s parents, landed Krzyzewski to play at Army.

Those four years changed Krzyzewski’s life, providing him world-class leadership training, life lessons and basketball knowledge he carries to this day.

Wednesday, when Knight died at age 83, the 76-year-old Krzyzewski reflected on a relationship that sent him on his own path to the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame.

“We lost one of the greatest coaches in the history of basketball today,” Krzyzewski said in a statement. “Clearly, he was one of a kind.”

Learning from, and passing, Knight

After his playing career ended, Krzyzewski began his college coaching career as a graduate assistant coach for Knight at Indiana during the 1974-75 season. Then Krzyzewski accepted his first college head coaching job, at Army, in 1975 when he was 28 years old.

His five seasons there preceded his arrival in Durham, where he became Duke’s coach in 1980 From there, Krzyzewski embarked on a trajectory where he joined Knight among the sport’s best and eventually surpassed his accomplishments.

While Knight won three NCAA championships at Indiana, Krzyzewski captured five during his 42 seasons with the Blue Devils. On Nov. 15, 2011, at New York’s Madison Square Garden, Duke beat Michigan State, 74-69, for Krzyzewski’s 903rd career win.

That pushed him past Knight, who had previously held the record with 902. Knight was courtside calling the game in his post-coaching job with ESPN. The two embraced, with Knight cracking wise about how Krzyzewski had not done too bad for a guy who couldn’t shoot.

Krzyzewski and Knight’s complicated relationship

That was when the two were on good terms, which wasn’t always the case. Knight and Krzyzewski spent most of the 1990s in a state of estrangement. They mended things with Krzyzewski was selected for the Naismith Hall of Fame’s 2001 class and he asked Knight to present him at the enshrinement ceremony.

But the situation turned sour again, once again with Knight perceiving that Krzyzewski slighted him, over the final years of Knight’s life.

ESPN’s Jay Bilas, a former Duke player and assistant coach, wrote an essay published Wednesday night describing his friendship with Knight over the years. The two worked together at ESPN and knew each other through Krzyzewski.

Knight, Bilas said, “allowed small things to affect an important lifetime relationship.”

“Knight’s on-again, off-again relationship with Mike Krzyzewski, my college coach and mentor, was a sore spot with Knight and me,” Bilas wrote. “I never understood it. I knew how proud Knight was of Coach K, and how much Coach K meant to him. But, I just couldn’t wrap my head around how Knight would negatively react to any perceived slight or miscommunication that, to others, was insignificant.”

But no matter how complicated their relationship became, one thing remained between Krzyzewski and Knight: mutual respect.

“Coach Knight recruited me, mentored me, and had a profound impact on my career and in my life,” Krzyzewski said in his statement. “This is a tremendous loss for our sport and our family is deeply saddened by his passing.”