Where does Krzyzewski rank?

Agate page.

 

We put together a nice big refer for the top of A1.

 

For covering up a sexual assault for a year? He's still behind a few other guys.

 

At the Final Four in 2001, a well-known national hoops writer had a few too many and was talking about how strange Duke fans were. He wasn't including students or locals, but said if you meet someone and they say Duke is their favorite team that they are probably one of the most insecure people ever, people who feel the need to align themselves with a program that is so dominant, but so wildly disliked.

I'm not saying I agree with him, but it was a pretty funny diatribe.

 

So why is Duke so wildly disliked?

Coach K's personality puts people off?

Too successful? Privileged? Regularly bests teams with other huge basketball fan bases -- UNC, UK, etc?

 

I think it's the "too successful" and "too privileged" more than anything else... I don't think younger people look at Duke the way those of us in our late 30s and 40s do because they Duke they know isn't that different from the other top programs.

 

It started with Laettner.

Nobody hated Duke before Laettner.

 

I've been fascinated with Kryzyzewski for awhile, largely because of the way he's portrayed nationally compared to the way he really is. It's not that he's evil or anything, but he is so not the person that ESPN and other places make him seem to be.

I had a one-on-one with him before the 2002 season and he was just incredible. I don't know if I got him on a good day or what, but I asked him if he thought the way he and the program were portrayed was accurate and he said, "If the perception is that we don't make the same mistakes as other programs or that we think we're better than everybody else, then I'm wildly uncomfortable with that." He laughed when I told him that another coach had described him as "Bobby Knight with slightly better judgment."

One of the Duke beat writers called me and said, "I've covered that asshole for X number of years and he's never given me anything like that."

 

Laettner was definitely where it really started, but I don't think Ferry teams were very well-liked either.

 

No, Ferry's teams were fine. They had Dawkins, Ammaker and a few others. And then after that came the team that beat UNLV which of course was everyone's favorite team.

It was Laettner, and more specifically Laettner as a senior. Then you had slap-the-floor guys like Wojo and Collins, and then Reddick ... but without Laettner I don't think anyone ever really starts hating them.

Of course, Coach K's sanctimonious act also contributed. And the entitled and used-to-be-racist asshole factory that is the Cameron Crazies.

OK there are a lot of reasons.

 

It's because their white guys are annoying rather than fun and goofy like Kaminsky.

 

But mainly the honkies.