GREENSBORO, N.C. — If you've watched a game of college basketball over the last 4 decades, chances are you are familiar with the face of Duke Basketball. Coach Mike Krzyzewski, mercifully nicknamed "Coach K", has been the head coach of the Blue Devils for 42 years. The average length of a marriage in the United States is just 8.2 years which means Coach K and the Blue Devils are what the kids might call "relationship goals".
Under his leadership, the Blue Devils have gone from feisty underdogs to one of college basketball's most hated powerhouses. 5 National Championships, 35 NCAA tournament appearances, and a slew of NBA first-round picks; Coach K just might be the single greatest hire in men's basketball history.
Don't get it twisted, the Duke basketball program was not some farce before K's arrival in Durham. Just 3 years prior the Blue Devils were playing for the 1978 national championship under then-coach Bill Foster. What is truly amazing is how much better Duke's been with Coach K at the helm.
The chart below compares Coach K's 42 seasons at Duke with the 42 seasons before he was named head coach of the Blue Devils. Conveniently, that time period is also 42 seasons and starts with the 1938-1939 season which was the first to conclude with the NCAA tournament. How tidy!
Despite playing almost 300 more games under Coach K, they have 71 fewer losses which just should not be possible. Without a doubt, the Blue Devils have improved across the board under K but nothing is more impactful than their success in the NCAA tournament.
The 35 appearances and 97 wins are both NCAA records and his 5 national championships are the most won by a coach not named John Wooden. Duke has become so successful in the postseason the schadenfreude is rampant when they do lose.
Speaking of records, Coach K owns 12 of them while finishing in the top ten in 23 out of the 40 coaching records he qualifies for as a division one men's basketball coach.
We have not even gotten to his other coaching exploits. As Senior Head Coach of the US men's team, he had a record of 88-1, ending on a 76 game winning streak. Krzyzewski became the first coach in the world to win 3 straight Olympic gold medals, the last of which capped off an incredible 3-year coaching stretch. From 2014-2016, Coach K won gold at the 2014 FIBA World Championships, while going undefeated, then he won the 2015 NCAA Championship only to follow that up with another 2 years of undefeated play in international basketball that was capped off by that last gold medal in the 2016 RIO Olympics.
Coach K was already inducted into the Naismith Hall of Fame in 2001 but an argument could be made that he has had a second hall of fame worthy career since then.
Growing up a UNC fan, I take absolutely no pleasure in saying this but, the stats are undeniable, Coach K is a generational talent and the most successful coach of all time.