The General finally passed Dean Smith as the winningest coach in men’s NCAA Basketball history…my opinion? I’ve always liked Knight…I like his motion offence that forces players to share the ball…I like his commitment to man defence…I love his hard-ass style but I don’t think it’s the only way to coach…I love the fact that de graduates almost all of his players…I love the fact that he was the greatest single fundraiser in the history of Indiana University, single-handedly procuring funding for the Indiana University Library, which is one of the finest in the world…and I must admit, that boorish as he is, I like his insistence on being himself, like it or not, take it or leave it…however, some of the language being used to describe his accomplishment is a little bit out there…one writer called him “one of the all-time winners”…for perspective, all time winners in the NCAA are people like John Wooden (10 NCAA titles) or my favourite, Iowa wrestling coach Dan Gable…as a college wrestler, Gable was the best ever being both a national and Olympic champion who only lost 1 match in four years of college…Gable was then the head wrestling coach at Iowa for 21 seasons where the Hawkeyes won 15 national titles, 21 Big Ten Conference crowns and completed seven perfect seasons…again, don’t get me wrong, I love Knight and what he’s accomplished, but the hype is as much about personality as it is accomplishment…

Men’s basketball Coaches with 700 victories who have spent a minimum of 10 seasons in Division I

Coach Wins
x-Bob Knight, Texas Tech 880
Dean Smith, North Carolina 879
Adolph Rupp, Kentucky 876
Jim Phelan, Mt. St. Mary's, Md. 830
Eddie Sutton, Oklahoma State 798
Lefty Driesell, Georgia State 786
Lou Henson, New Mexico State 779
x-Lute Olson, Arizona 772
x-Mike Krzyzewski, Duke 765
Henry Iba, Oklahoma State 764
Ed Diddle, Western Kentucky 759
Phog Allen, Kansas 746
x-Jim Calhoun, Connecticut 744
John Chaney, Temple 741
x-Jim Boeheim, Syracuse 737
Jerry Tarkanian, Fresno State 729
Norm Stewart, Missouri 728
Ray Meyer, DePaul 724
Don Haskins, Texas-El Paso 719

x-Active coaches

A few things before we address all things Knight:

NFL…Deion Sanders comments about Vince Young during Saturday night’s telecast: "Vince young is insationable' out there!” What?

Wow…Boise State over Oklahoma 43-42 in overtime…this was simply the best college bowl game I have ever seen, and I estimate I’ve seen over 100 in my lifetime…

Ben Gordon is bananas…Only two sixth men in history have averaged 20 points for a whole season: Ricky Pierce and Eddie Johnson. Gordon entered Friday's play at 20.1 ppg after hanging 40 on Miami…

1) From the AP:

Knight breaks record - The General sets men's D-I mark with victory No. 880

Bob Knight won 880 games doing things his way. And he sure celebrated it his way. Long appreciated for his strategy and long questioned for his methods, Knight added the crowning achievement to his Hall of Fame career by becoming the leader in Division I men's basketball victories when Texas Tech beat New Mexico 70-68 on Monday. Having finally reached the pinnacle he's long insisted didn't matter, Knight proved otherwise by soaking in every moment of the party that followed -- especially the soundtrack. "I've always thought that if there's ever an occasion for a song to be played on my behalf, I wanted it to be Frank Sinatra singing My Way," said Knight, whose usually glaring facade showed hints of cracking during the outpouring of emotions. "I don't expect you people to have agreed with what I've done -- and, if I did [care], I would have asked your opinion. And I have never asked the opinions of very many. I've simply tried to do what I think is best in the way that I think you have to do it. I think I've put myself out on a limb at times, knowingly, simply because I thought what I was going to do or say was the best way to get this kid to be the best player or the best student." Knight has been a college coach for 41 of his 66 years, having broken in at Army and made his mark by winning three national titles in 29 years at Indiana. Fired by Indiana after administrators could no longer tolerate his behavior, he resurfaced at this college basketball outpost in 2001 and has guided the Red Raiders to unprecedented heights. He's a complex package, someone who can hit a policeman, throw a chair across the court or be accused of wrapping his hands around a player's neck, yet never gets in trouble for breaking NCAA rules, always has high a graduation rate and gave his salary back a few years ago because he didn't think he'd earned it. All facets of Knight's personality were on display during a half-hour postgame ceremony and the nearly 20-minute soliloquy he gave instead of a news conference. He lovingly singled out a player whose hustle helped pull out this victory, which wasn't easy; Tech blew a 20-point lead and trailed by four points with 6:25 remaining. The Red Raiders (11-4) finally went back ahead with 2:04 left and managed to hold on. The first person to congratulate him was his son and successor-to-be, Pat. He later held his two grandsons from his other son, Tim. He introduced his wife and repeatedly thanked her, although he later broke a promise to her by cussing. "The first 15 minutes of the game was Karen's game plan," he said of his wife, a former high school coach. "The rest of it was mine, unfortunately." He praised Tech's current chancellor by noting "what an improvement you are" over the predecessor Knight had sparred with at a salad bar. He called his current athletic director one of the best friends he's ever had. "I've had the chance to work with some really great athletic directors and some really bad ones," he said. "I appreciate what I learned from the bad ones." He introduced as "our prized student" the player he suspended for academic reasons at the start of the season. He jokingly tapped the chin of the player whose chin he had jerked earlier this season and told all his players, "If you guys still love me after everything I say to you and everything I put you through, that's a hell of a compliment to me." Not interested in answering reporters' questions, Knight instead went on a trip down memory lane that was filled with anecdotes and name-dropping, from the famous such as Red Auerbach, Pete Newell and Clair Bee to the obscure, such as Jake Pryne, the bus driver at Army when Knight was 24 and the nation's youngest coach. He seemed close to tears at times. Though none fell, he backed away from the microphone a couple of times while on the court, seemingly unable to speak. His eyes moistened while talking to reporters. In the coaches' locker room later, Knight was asked whether his emotions got the best of him. Gently rocking his head, with his hands clasped over his hair, he paused and said, "Well, I don't know. Maybe." Knight summoned an Associated Press reporter after the news conference because he was upset that he'd forgotten to thank Dean Smith, whose record he broke. He also had a parting piece of advice. "You make damn sure you put Frank Sinatra's song in your article," Knight said. Earlier, he explained why My Way was so fitting. "I've simply tried to do what I think is best," Knight said. "Regrets? Sure. Just like the song. I have regrets. I wish I could done things better at times. I wish I would have had a better answer, a better way, at times. But just like he said, I did it my way and when I look back on it, I don't think my way was all that bad." The celebration began with as much relief over the win as the fact Knight got the record on his second try. The game wasn't decided until a long 3-pointer by New Mexico's J.R. Giddens bounced off the rim at the buzzer. Red and black confetti fell and the song played. There were speeches by Knight and administrators, plus videotaped tributes from Smith, Duke's Mike Krzyzewski and Texas' Rick Barnes, and statements from several NBA coaches who played for Knight. He also received two trophies and the game ball; a banner was unfurled marking this achievement. "You are the best there's ever been," said Krzyzewski, who played for Knight and served as his assistant. "I'm so glad you've been my mentor, you've been my coach and you've been my friend." Knight's career record is 880-354. He recently agreed to a contract extension through the 2010-11 season, which doesn't bode well for anyone hoping to break his record. Consider this: Krzyzewski has 765 wins and is 59; he'll be 64 in 2011 and might still be 100 wins behind. Knight admits the record is a byproduct of longevity. The ultimate standard of college basketball coaching excellence is the 10 national titles won by UCLA's John Wooden, all in a 12-year span. Also worth noting: Tennessee women's coach Pat Summitt has won the most NCAA games, 925; and Harry Statham of NAIA McKendree College in Lebanon, Ill., has won the most men's games at a four-year college, 925. Tony Danridge led New Mexico (11-4) with 17 points and Giddens had 14. Jay Jackson and Martin Zeno led Tech with 22 points each.

2) From USAToday.com:

A look throughout the career of Texas Tech coach Bob Knight:

1960— Was 'sixth man' on Ohio State University's national championship team.
1965-66— First season as head coach at Army.
Feb. 27, 1971— Leads Army to 64-50 victory over Navy for 100th career win.
March 27, 1971— Hired as head coach at the Indiana University
March, 1973— Leads Indiana to first of 11 Big Ten titles and reaches Final Four for the first time, where Hoosiers fall to UCLA in national semifinals.
Dec. 19, 1975— Hoosiers beat Georgia 93-56 for Knight's 200th career victory.
1975— Named National Coach of the Year for the first time.
March 29, 1976— Indiana topples Michigan 86-68 to complete undefeated season (32-0) and claim the first of Knight's three NCAA Championships. Knight is also named National Coach of the Year for the second consecutive season and becomes the only coach to win a national title as a player and a coach (North Carolina's Dean Smith joins him in the coach-player national championship feat in 1982).
1976— Upset over two turnovers in a Big Ten game, Knight grabs sophomore Jim Wisman by the jersey and jerks him into his seat.
1979— Knight is charged and later convicted in absentia for hitting a policeman before practice at the Pan American Games in Puerto Rico.
Feb. 7, 1980— Indiana tops Northwestern 83-69 for 300th career victory.
1980— Playfully fires a blank shot at a reporter. A week later, Knight and his wife take turns chiding an Assembly Hall crowd for not cheering enough during a game.
March 30, 1981— Led by Isiah Thomas, Knight's Hoosiers jolt North Carolina 63-50 in Philadelphia for Knight's second championship and the school's fourth national title.
1981— Uses his weekly program to show films of a "sucker punch" involving Isiah Thomas and Purdue's Roosevelt Barnes, which he said proved Thomas' innocence. Brought a donkey wearing a Purdue cap onto his TV show. In Philadelphia for the Final Four, Knight gets into a shoving match with an LSU fan, who says the coach stuffed him into a garbage can.
1983— Knight criticizes Big Ten officiating by standing at midcourt and cursing at Big Ten Commissioner Wayne Duke, who is in the press box. Two days later, Knight assails the referees for the "worst officiating I have seen in 12 years."
Dec. 8, 1984— Tallies 400th career win with 81-68 triumph over Kentucky.
1985— Tosses a chair across the court during a game against Purdue, prompting his ejection and a one-game suspension.
1986— Receives technical foul for shouting at the officials during a game against Illinois, then kicks a megaphone and admonishes Indiana cheerleaders for disrupting a free-throw attempt by Steve Alford.
March 30, 1987— Keith Smart's late jumper gives Knight's Hoosiers a 74-73 victory over Syracuse for coach's third national championship with school. Is also named National Coach of the Year for the third time.
1987— Bangs fist on the scorer's table after being assessed a technical foul during a game against LSU. NCAA fines university $10,000, and Knight receives a reprimand. Refuses to let his team finish an exhibition game against the Soviet Union after he was ejected for arguing with a referee. He's later reprimanded by the university.
1988— In an NBC interview with Connie Chung, who asked how he handles stress, Knight says: "I think that if rape is inevitable, relax and enjoy it." He explains he was talking about something beyond one's control, not the act of rape.
1989— Named National Coach of the Year for the fourth time after Hoosiers go 27-8 and win Big Ten Championship before falling to Seton Hall in Sweet 16.
Jan. 14, 1989— Notches 500th career win as Indiana trips up Northwestern 92-76.
1991— Asks not to be renominated to the Basketball Hall of Fame, calling the voters' rejection of him in 1987 a "slap in the face." Nevertheless, he was elected and inducted into the Hall. Publicly feuds with Illinois coach Lou Henson, who called him a "classic bully" who thrived on intimidation. Bars a female Associated Press reporter from the locker room, saying it was inappropriate for her to be there and also against university policy. All reporters subsequently were barred from the locker room.
1992— Gives a mock whipping to Calbert Cheaney, a black player, during practice for the NCAA West Regional, offending several black leaders. Knight denies any racial connotations and notes the bullwhip was given to him by the players.
Jan. 6, 1993— Reaches 600 wins with a 75-67 victory over Big Ten rival Iowa.
1993— Is suspended for one game after a sideline tirade in a 101-82 victory over Notre Dame in which he screams at his player son, Pat, and kicks at him. When fans behind the Indiana bench boo, Knight turns and responds with an obscenity.
1994— Head-butts Sherron Wilkerson while screaming at him on the bench but says it was unintentional. After the next game, the Hoosiers' home finale against Wisconsin, Knight tales the public address microphone and recites a profane verse directed at his critics.
1995— Is reprimanded and fined $30,000 by the NCAA for an outburst at a news conference at NCAA tournament. Upset that an NCAA media liaison erroneously says he would not attend the news conference, Knight lashes out at him.
March 5, 1997— Earns win No. 700 with a 70-66 triumph over Wisconsin.
1998— Is fined $10,000 by the Big Ten for berating referee Ted Valentine, whose officiating Knight calls "the greatest travesty" he had seen in his coaching career. Knight receives three technical fouls and is ejected by Valentine during the second half of a loss to Illinois.
1999— Is investigated for possible battery after allegedly choking a man at a restaurant. The man reportedly confronted Knight as he was leaving, contending he heard Knight make a racist remark. Prosecutor refuses to file charges. Assistant Ron Felling is fired after Knight allegedly throws him out of a chair after hearing him criticize the program.
2000— Is investigated in March by university after former player Neil Reed says Knight choked him at a practice in 1997. In May, Knight's suspended for three games, ordered to pay a $30,000 fine and barred from having physical contact with a player or university employee by IU President Myles Brand after an investigation found a pattern of inappropriate behavior. Is accused on Sept. 7 of grabbing a student by the arm, cursing and lecturing him about manners after the coach was addressed "Hey, Knight, what's up?" Three days later, Knight's fired for violating "zero-tolerance" policy and for what university President Myles Brand calls a "pattern of unacceptable behavior."
March 23, 2001— After a year away from coaching, Knight is hired to lead Texas Tech's program.
2001— General manager at the Compaq Center in Houston says Knight, now coach at Texas Tech, offered to fight him over remarks the coach made about the arena's locker room — it "would have been very, very cramped with four midgets."
Feb. 5, 2003— Becomes youngest coach – at 62 – to reach 800 victories as Texas Tech downed Nebraska 75-49.
2003— Launches into a profanity-filled tirade after an ESPN reporter asks about his relationship with former player Steve Alford, who also was participating in the interview. Alford's Iowa team was playing Texas Tech in Dallas. Knight later apologized.
2004— Gets into a loud verbal spat with Texas Tech's chancellor at an upscale Lubbock grocery store. Is reprimanded — but not suspended — by the university.
2006— Approaches sophomore Michael Prince, using his hand to push his chin, apparently in an effort to get him to look up while talking to Knight during a timeout.
Dec. 23, 2006 — Ties Dean Smith's record of 879 victories when Texas Tech defeats Bucknell 72-60. Knight downplays the feat, saying "I'd like to have hit 62 home runs. Then I think I would've accomplished something."
Jan. 1, 2007— After failing in his first attempt to break Dean Smith's record, Bob Knight becomes the all-time leader in wins with a 70-68 defeat of New Mexico.

3) From Steve Wieberg of USAToday.com:

Knight still standing on his principles

LUBBOCK, Texas — For nearly 40 years, the hell of Army Ranger training has stuck with Dick Murray. Traipsing through swampland. Scraping down cliffs. Surviving on C rations and an hour or two of sleep a day, all too often beneath pelting rain or falling snow. "I think we started with 227 students. We graduated with 87," remembers Murray, a former basketball captain at the U.S. Military Academy who says he made it through the nine-week ordeal because of one man. Murray was a sophomore when the coach destined to become college basketball's all-time wins leader joined the Cadets as an assistant in 1963. He was a senior when Knight took charge of the program, insisting on maximum effort and precision, grabbing jerseys and whistling balls at the heads of players who failed to deliver, always pushing, plumbing their physical and psychological depths in much the same way he knew the military would. Knight was only 24 and already brilliant but mercurial, headed for the Hall of Fame and critics' cross hairs. "I've never worried," he says, "about how I try to get a kid to be the best player possible. I do some things I'm sure that a lot of people wouldn't want to do." Murray saw no such ambiguity. Only months removed from the basketball court and West Point, he was a young officer testing his special-forces mettle in the mountains of Georgia and the muck of the Florida Panhandle. "The values system and the mental toughness that come from being associated with Coach Knight were what gave me — I want to use MacArthur's words — the indomitable spirit that says I'm not quitting this thing despite all these guys falling out around me," he says. "He was the one who really taught me to be a man."
It is but one measure of Knight's four eventful decades on the sidelines. He has won more games than John Wooden and Henry Iba and everybody in his sport except Adolph Rupp and Dean Smith. With three victories, he'll surpass Rupp's 876. With six more, he'll break Smith's record of 879. Beyond that are 27 NCAA Tournament appearances, five Final Fours, three national championships and an Olympic gold medal over a career that has taken Knight from Army to Indiana to Texas Tech. He has done it all without so much as a brush with NCAA rules, while graduating players. That's only part of the spell he casts, of course. Knight has warred with referees, with opposing coaches, with his own assistants and players. He has been convicted in absentia of striking a Puerto Rican police officer, tossed a chair across the court during a game against Purdue and refused to let his team finish an exhibition against the Soviet national team. Indiana had its fill six years ago and fired him. Texas Tech, coming off four consecutive losing seasons and an 11th-place finish in the Big 12 Conference, snatched him up a year later, and Knight has responded with 110 wins and three NCAA berths in five-plus seasons. He, too, sees West Point's imprint. "The way those kids learned to compete in basketball, what better training was there for an officer who had to go into combat and had the lives of other people at stake?" says Knight, who stayed six years as head coach and a total of eight seasons at Army. "I thought it was really important there. And when I went on, that stuck with me. I want a kid to think back that the best class he had in college was playing basketball. I don't worry about how I accomplish it." People think he's overly tough? Imperious? A bully? They grumble that he crossed the line of proper behavior yet again when he gave Texas Tech sophomore Michael Prince a bop to the chin during a timeout two weeks ago? Knight cares little. Not a star player Knight wasn't a great player himself but was good enough to make an Ohio State team that reached three NCAA title games and won one. He has absorbed a lifetime of coaching lessons from fellow Hall of Famers Joe Lapchick, Clair Bee, Fred Taylor and Pete Newell, among others. And he is supreme in his self-belief. A voracious reader, Knight's attention to one detail of David Halberstam's best-selling account of the country's descent into the Vietnam quagmire, The Best and the Brightest, is telling. "That was a frightening thing for me to read," he says, "because the Kennedys, every decision they made, was based on polls and how they thought it would affect the next election. "Do what's right and do what you think you have to do and don't worry about what somebody says. That would be about as simply put as my philosophy could be. If I've felt I needed to get on some kid's ass during a game rather than after the game ... I think I've kind of exposed myself (to critics). But it's never bothered me, because I've thought that's the thing I had to do." Texas Tech athletics director Gerald Myers, the Red Raiders' former coach, paints his old friend as misunderstood: "I think a lot of people who don't know him make judgments about him (based) on what they've heard or what they've read or what they've seen. You know, none of us are perfect. His good qualities far outweigh his bad." It is the credo of Knight's allies. He clashed with Tech's chancellor during a happenstance meeting at a lunchtime salad bar early in 2004, drawing a reprimand from the school. Since then, his famous temper has been in abeyance. (Knight ascribed his exchange with Prince during the Nov. 13 win vs. Gardner-Webb to motivational technique, not anger, and Meyers and the player backed him up.) Knight nonetheless waves off any suggestion that, at age 66, he has mellowed. Yes, things have been a little quieter here in West Texas but, "I don't think I do things any differently," he says. "I think what happens here is you're a little more removed from things. People don't come out here as much." The game, he says, is much the same as it was when he broke in. You prepare kids; you try to get them to compete. What was it the Army used to preach? Be all you can be. Basketball is about that, too. And Knight is as obsessively about that as any individual the sport has seen. It may be interesting to gauge the reaction outside of Lubbock to his impending record-setting 880th win. Knight always has had a prickly relationship with the media, and he hardly gets — and refuses to court — the unconditional love accorded a Wooden and a Smith. Pat Knight, who played for his father at Indiana and, like his dad, is starting his sixth season at Texas Tech, sees the mark as "redemption in a way from all the negative publicity he's gotten over the years. ... "It's not warm and fuzzy love (that matters). I think it's respect. Even the guys who don't like him, they're going to have to respect him for what he's done." His dad will take that. Knight's well-known idol was baseball great Ted Williams, who aspired, he told a friend, "that when I walk down the street, folks will say, 'There goes the greatest hitter that ever lived.' " Knight has his own version of that wish. Twenty-some years ago, he says, he was being courted to coach the NBA's Phoenix Suns and called Newell, his friend and mentor and, at 91, still an esteemed basketball consultant. "He asked me, 'What do you want to get out of coaching?' " Knight recalls. "And I told him, 'I want to be thought of by (other) coaches in the same vein that you're thought of by coaches.' "That," he says, "is the most important thing I could ask for in terms of a legacy in basketball." For everybody else — the writers who wonder if the end justifies Knight's means, the dads who debate whether they'd put their kids in his coaching care — there is indifference. "You're sitting there ... and you say, 'Boy, I wouldn't want my son to play for him,' " Knight says. "Well, if you want your kid to be a goddamn success, you probably ought to want him to play for me."

4) From Bob Kravitz of the Indianapolis Star:

Here is a lot of what I read now as Bob Knight surpasses Dean Smith on the all-time wins list in Division I basketball coaching. I read revisionist history. I read how Knight he really isn’t such a lout after all, how he’s just another misunderstood genius, that great men are allowed great flaws as they pursue greatness. It’s as if the number — now 880 after Texas Tech’s victory Monday over New Mexico — obviates all the behavioral lapses that make him one of the most polarizing, perplexing, frustrating figures in sports history. First things first: If he was going to break this record — and hold it until his old player, Mike Krzyzewski, breaks it someday — I’m glad it was Anywhere But Indiana University. Whether it was Texas Tech or New Mexico or Minnesota hardly matters. For all the great things Knight he did for my alma mater, by the end, he was an embarrassment whose continued presence revealed the president and trustees as invertebrates who could be intimidated like so many others through his near-three decades. For those who now say he should have broken the record in Bloomington, I would suggest they hearken back to the summer of 2000 and recall the ugliness that Knight engendered. Can you imagine if he’d been allowed to slide — again — after the whole Neil Reed mess? Or the Kent Harvey situation? If Knight had been enabled once again through those sets of circumstances, I can promise you, he would have ended up sadly, like football icon Woody Hayes at Ohio State, forced to retire in shame well short of the all-time wins mark. He is where he should be. At Texas Tech, where they were begging local Lubbock fans to fill their arena to celebrate Knight’s great accomplishment. In exile. He had everything a college basketball coach could want in Bloomington:, a supportive administration, a loving fan base, a mostly malleable media corps (with the exception of my predecessor, Bill Benner) and a run of the house. And he blew it. Blew it with his own arrogance. Blew it chance after chance after chance. He got the mother of all second chances after the Neil Reed fiasco, and blew that. What was “zero tolerance”? It was common sense. Don’t be a (bleep) to people. He couldn’t hold the line. Never could. That’s what’s has always bothered me about Knight, why I can’t separate the great coach from the great bully. I hear he graduates players, wins games, doesn’t cheat, supports his university. Well, a lot of coaches do that, luminaries like Smith and Krzyzewski leading the way, and yet they’ve done it while maintaining their humanity and a semblance of humility, done it without leaving scorched earth behind them. I cannot separate the guy who wins basketball games and the one who insists on leaving behind him such a trail of human destruction. I cannot separate the guy who does good things for others and the guy who viciously tears down anybody who challenges his hegemony or black-and-white sensibility. Of course, I didn’t play for the man, and, in most cases, if you played for the man, you loved him, appreciated or at least slowly came around to understanding the method to his madness. “I love the man,” Isiah Thomas said recently when the New York Knicks were in town to play the Indiana Pacers. “I’ve said time and again, I don’t think I would be the person I am or the player I was if it hadn’t been for him. Don’t get me wrong, they weren’t always good times. But I appreciate what he did for me. And I understand it better now than when I did when I was younger. “Most of the time when he was on our tails about something, it never really was about basketball;, it was always about helping you become a better person in your life. It wasn’t, ‘Isiah, you need to become a better passer or rebounder.’ His thinking was, if you make the man, the player will come.” But there was always that dark side, which cannot be conveniently expunged from the catalogue simply because Knight has passed a milestone. For me, the seminal Knight moment came after the Hoosiers lost to Missouri in the first round of the 1994-95 NCAA Tournament in Boise, Idaho. Moments before Knight was supposed to address the media, Rance Pugmire, the poor sap who was volunteering as a media liaison, told us that someone he believed to be with the IU basketball program told him Knight was not going to appear. When The General ascended the podium minutes later, he verbally laid into the man, who was doing nothing more than his job and was guilty, at the very most, of a completely innocent mistake. Typical. More typical than the public really knows. That was, and is, the odd duality of Knight: He demands discipline, but he has so little himself. Make no mistake: He’s one of the greatest basketball coaches who’s has ever lived. As has been mentioned thousands of times before, he wins, he graduates players, he plays by the rules and he usually stands for the right things. He didn’t change as much as he needed to over the years; that probably explains why his later IU teams stumbled so badly. But like his old friend and idol, Ted Williams, who wished only to hear fans say, “There goes the best hitter who ever lived,” Knight has earned similar acclaim. “There goes the best college basketball coach who ever lived.” Although there will be some very good arguments from the Dean Smith faithful, who will note that Smith won his games in fewer years, and from the Krzyzewski camp, who will extrapolate the number and say that Coack K will turn the Knight record into a historical speed bump. So now the big man in the big sweater gets his day, and, like a lot of people, I am torn, faced with something of a conundrum: How do I applaud and hold my nose at the same time?

5) From Luke Winn of SI.com:

Back where it started - Bob Knight built a legacy with his first team at Army

Eight of them came to Lubbock in November to witness the start of the season in which their coach, Robert Montgomery Knight, would break the all-time record for Division I wins. These particular visitors were in their early 60s, just a few years younger than Knight. They played golf with him, ate barbeque, and told old basketball tales; some even sat in on Texas Tech's meetings and film sessions. Most stayed to see Knight record victories 870, 871 and 872. Forty-one years ago, those men were on the floor for win No. 1 as members of the 1965-66 Army team. The reunion crowd in Lubbock (Bill Helkie, Paul Heiner, John Mikula, Dick Murray, Mike Noonan, Bill Platt, Bill Schutsky, and Bob Seigle) along with five others who weren't present (Townsend Clarke, Jack Isenhour, Ed Jordan, Dan Schrage and Mike Silliman) won 18 games for Knight that season, which he began at the ripe old age of 25. Knight won 102 games at West Point, 622 at Indiana, and the last 156, including Monday's victory over New Mexico, at Texas Tech. The Internet generation of hoopheads -- many of whom were born in the late '70s or early '80s -- was raised on the red sweater-wearing Knight who won the 1987 national title with Keith Smart and Steve Alford ... as well as the Knight of many explosive lowlights, including chair-chucking, ref-berating, journalist-cursing and Neil Reed-choking. They remember the "zero-tolerance" policy at Indiana and Knight's eventual ouster from Hoosierland. That Knight has been covered ad nauseum. But what about the young coach who, just four seasons after graduating from Ohio State, took over the reins of the Army basketball program while the U.S. was on the brink of the Vietnam War? Over the past two weeks we spoke with four members of Knight's first team -- men who played under Knight when he was an actual, enlisted Army private, not a Dick Vitale-nicknamed "General" -- and asked them to tell stories that help develop a portrait of the polarizing icon as a young man. The coach who would eventually surpass Dean Smith and Adolph Rupp in the record books was still developing his style back in 1965, and he favored a coat and tie instead of the trademark sweater, but his passion and volatility were already evident.

Chip off the Locke - By the winter of '65, Knight already had a strong reputation for both his basketball acumen and fiery behavior at West Point, after spending '63 and '64 coaching the plebe team and serving as Tates Locke's varsity assistant. (With a draft in effect, Knight said in his autobiography, Knight: My Story, that he came to Army "thinking about getting my military obligation out of the way and doing some coaching, too.") Locke had a Knight-like intensity level, and the two coaches were hellishly physical players -- to the point of causing fights -- in the Army's noontime faculty league. (Locke, who left for Miami of Ohio, once gashed open his hand by punching out a wire-and-glass gym window after losing a pickup game.) Knight performed his advance-scouting duties under Locke with fervor and attention to minute detail. Says 6-foot-2 guard Dick Murray, who was Knight's first captain: "I always contended that [Knight] meant at least eight points every ballgame to us because of his scouting reports." It was an era in which game film was not widely available, and Murray recalls that Knight would stand before a blackboard in the locker room, draw out a court, "and tell us exactly what they were going to be doing" -- everything from offensive sets to the smallest of individual habits, such as shot-fake tendencies or susceptibilities on defense. "We would have those other teams down to a T," says Murray. "After Knight's reports, we would go through drills on how we were going to take them out of their rhythm, and how we were going to beat them down."

Valuable lesson - After going 21-8 the previous season under Locke and losing in the NIT semifinals, Knight's first team went 18-8 and also lost in the NIT semis. The coach who went on to win 880 games was not victorious in his first contest however, losing 70-49 at Princeton while his All-America forward, Mike Silliman, sat out after an appendectomy. (The first win came in game No. 2, against Worcester Tech.) Knight did learn a lesson about pre-game ritual on that day, though. In his autobiography he said, "I wasn't sure what to do [in the locker room], so I thought we should say a little prayer. I said, 'Let's bow our heads and say The Lord's Prayer.'" Ed Pillings, the team trainer, came up to Knight as they were walking up the stairs and said, "For whatever it's worth, let me tell you: you and prayers just aren't a good mix." Knight took the advice. It would be the last time his team said the Lord's Prayer. In his book Same Knight, Different Channel, 1966 reserve forward Jack Isenhour follows the Lord's Prayer story with a quote Knight used years later on Alford: "God couldn't care less if we win or not." (The second half of which is, "He is not going to parachute in through the roof of this building and score when we need points.") Isenhour's book, published in 2003, provides a thorough history of that '65-66 season -- but it also resulted in him being no longer welcome at Knight's yearly reunions, because of its frank commentary on Knight's temper. Isenhour believes that some of that temper and intensity was fueled by working with Locke, but not all of it. "He did take some cues from Tates -- those guys were like two peas in a pod," Isenhour said this week. "But Tates was charming, and Bob was never charming. He never tried to be charming."

Early success - During Knight's record-tying win over Bucknell on Dec. 23, ESPN displayed a graphic with an all-time Knight team, and the first unit included one Army player: 6-foot-6 center Silliman, a former Mr. Basketball in Kentucky who went on to become Army's all-time leading scorer and the captain of the 1968 Olympic squad. Silliman, who died in June of 2000 of a heart attack at the age of 56, "got hidden somewhat at West Point, but he was the best player in the country [in '65-66]," according to teammate Bill Helkie. Knight said in his autobiography that Silliman "may still be the best player I've ever coached on a college team." It was a coup that Silliman was at West Point. Locke had beaten out Bluegrass juggernaut Adolph Rupp for his services, and with Silliman leading the charge (averaging 22 points and 11 boards per game), Knight's team was 10-4 heading into a January home date against Rutgers, which featured a guard named Jim Valvano. Army played its Wednesday games at 4 p.m., to small after-class crowds, and Isenhour says the 5,000-seat bleachers at its field house were "all but empty" when the Scarlet Knights visited. Which meant there were very few witnesses for the first major setback of Knight's coaching career. Helkie, a 6-3 sharpshooter from South Bend, Ind., who was the team's second-leading scorer and later went on to work with Alan Greenspan at the Federal Reserve, recalls what happened to Silliman as a "freaky" injury. "I can remember it vividly," Helkie says. "I drove up the court getting ready to pass the ball to Mike -- and I threw it and it went right over him, because he was on the floor, and there was no one around him." Silliman, then a senior, said that he felt something snap -- and the diagnosis was torn cartilege in his left knee, which brought an early end to his college career. A somewhat distraught Knight called mentor Clair Bee that night. Bee, the legendary Long Island University coach, had been in the stands for the Rutgers game and according to Knight, his only advice was, "Okay, who are we going to replace him with?" After losing Silliman, as well as starting guard Paul Heiner (due to academics), Knight would do more than salvage the rest of the year, going 5-2 to close the regular season with Helkie and Schutsky handling much of the scoring. "It was probably [Knight's] greatest coaching accomplishment that year," says Schutsky, who now works in Army's compliance office. "To lose his star player and have everyone come together to pick up the pieces, and have us play as well as we possibly could."

Getting defensive - In '65-66, Knight had yet to develop the motion offense for which he became famous. Helkie recalls that they ran a continuous set the coach called "reverse action" -- but he knew it was borrowed heavily from one of Knight's future mentors, ex-California coach Pete Newell. Why? "Because when we came down the court and started running it, other teams always called out 'California,'" Helkie says. A lack of size (Army's starting lineup was made up of players 6-3 or smaller) and scoring power (with Silliman out) forced Knight to place emphasis on a brand of in-your-face D that wasn't common during that era. Isenhour says that, "In those days, if you had the ball far from the basket, the guy guarding you often was 4-5 feet away. Well, you could be out at the halfcourt line, and somebody [on Army] would be in your shorts. It was so different of a defense that some teams thought we were dirty." Some of Murray's favorite moments of the season came in the second and third games after losing Silliman -- victories in which Army held Penn State to 39 points and Bucknell to 38. The Nittany Lions, who were 11-3 and coming off an NCAA tournament appearance the year before, were held to just seven first-half points on 2-of-24 shooting. As Murray recalls, "Their coach, John Egli, said to one of his assistants as he was walking off the court, 'It's a good thing we kicked the extra point.' That was the kind of defense we played in those days." Two days after the Penn State win, a game against Bucknell brought out some vintage Knight. Murray says that Knight and Bison coach Don Smith, "were chatting before the game, and Smith made some disparaging remark about how Penn State only scored 39 points" -- which Knight took as a serious insult against the Army defense. "Coach walked into the locker room and laid it on us," Murray says. "He was steaming. He said, 'I want you to show them what you did Penn State.' Well, Bucknell ended up with one point less -- 38."

Knight time in N.Y. - At halftime of the greatest game the Black Knights played that season, Knight vomited. Army came into the NIT semifinals as a heavy underdog against San Francisco, which had two future NBA second-round draft picks, Joe Ellis and Edwin Mueller. Helkie came out gunning in Madison Square Garden, scoring 25 in the first half to put Army up 39-24. Knight said in his autobiography that Army's athletic director, Colonel Raymond Murphy, came into the locker room and yelled, "I've never seen basketball played this well!" Knight said he got so nervous that he went into the shower room and threw up. The queasy coach and his Black Knights hung on to win 80-63, setting up a date in the semifinals against 19th-ranked BYU. Knight saved the season's biggest explosion for the biggest stage. Army was up 58-56 with just over two minutes left, when Helkie stepped in front of the Cougars' All-America guard, Dick Nemelka, to attempt to take a charge. And even to this day, Helkie says, "It's one of those things that you don't like to think about. I was the guy who got the bad call. The ref who was right behind me [Lou Eisenstein] started to call charge ... and then the ref who was blocked off from the play by about 4-6 players [Bud Fidgeon], ran up and overruled him. It was clear to me that it was a bad call." As Isenhour recounts in his book, the game may have hung on this play. Helkie and Nemelka each had four fouls, and Helkie would have shot a 1-and-1 on a charge call to put Army up four, after which -- due to the fact there was no shot clock -- they could have hit more free throws and iced the game. But Eisenstein let Fidgeon's blocking call stand, and BYU rallied to win 66-60. Knight, Isenhour said, "went ballistic." Knight admits to smashing a water cooler, and Isenhour says there are accounts of him also punching a locker, kicking a door, slapping a wall and cursing out Eisenstein. Same Knight, Different Channel reprints a Knight quote in the New York Times which read, "Never have I ever said anything about officiating. But that was a gutless call tonight. Gutless." Locke, who was in attendance, told Isenhour that Knight bolted into the officials' locker room to go after Eisenstein, who was the only ref to ever work the NBA, NCAA and NIT finals in the same year. In the book, Locke says, "Eisenstein looked like a deer in the headlights. ... [Knight] grabbed him. He was tryin' to grab him, but Eisenstein was so fat he couldn't lift him off the floor." Eisenstein , though, discounted that story in the New York Post, saying that Knight merely stopped by "to tell us he was sorry that he had popped off." Knight dedicated a few lines to the incident in My Story, saying, "I thought that call cost us the game and said so very emphatically in the press conference after the game. That was my first major encounter with the press; I just got blistered in the newspapers." It would go down as the first on-the-record instance of Knight publicly criticizing officials -- a fitting coda for his first season as head coach. Over the 40 seasons and 862 wins that followed, he would experience greater successes, play on bigger stages, and find himself at the center of much more heated controversies, and yet coach's defining characteristics were all there in 1965-66. Army was only the beginning of the run at 880, but the players at West Point experienced Bob Knight in full.

6) From Mark Smith of the Albuquerque Journal:

Knight did it his way, and Lubbock's happy

LUBBOCK, Texas -- Maybe Bob Knight didn't care. But 15,098 others at United Spirit Arena did. So did a little thing called history. And in the end, even the crusty old General -- with confetti falling upon him and "My Way" blaring on the sound system -- had to admit that this New Year's Day was special. "I can't think of a better athletic situation in America," Knight said over the public address system after his Texas Tech Red Raiders beat New Mexico 70-68. "Where a president [Jon Whitmore], an athletic director [Gerald Myers] and now [chancellor] Kent [Hance], all three are great." With a nationally televised audience tuned in to witness the crowning of a new college coaching king, the Lobos (11-4) nearly put the coronation on hold again. J.R. Giddens' 35-foot desperation 3-pointer at the final horn was just long, though, and Tech (11-4) held on after blowing a 20-point first-half lead. Knight acknowledged the crowd, one that was announced as a sellout, even if some empty seats were noticeable.The victory was the 880th in the 41-year career of the Red Raiders' coach -- the most in the history of men's Division I college basketball, eclipsing the mark of Dean Smith. It touched off a wild celebration. For all but a few, that is. "He's done a lot for college basketball, congratulations to him, but it's too bad it had to be against us," said New Mexico sophomore guard Chad Toppert, whose trio of second-half 3s helped the Lobos erase the big early deficit. "… It had to be over somebody, but we tried to make sure it wasn't us." The UNLV Rebels made sure it wasn't them, beating Tech 74-66 in Lubbock last Thursday. A grand party was set for that night, but it had to be postponed until Monday. The fans were ready again, and this time were able to carry the Red Raiders down the stretch as Knight's club was forced to come from behind in the final minutes. "I'm here to see the record," said Tech fan Ann Martin. "The whole town has been looking forward to this all season -- especially since Thursday." Many of Knight's cohorts who came to Lubbock for Thursday's planned commemoration had since departed, but a number of statements -- from the likes of Smith, Rick Barnes, Mike Krzyzewski and Dick Vitale -- were read. Vitale, the color analyst for ESPN's coverage of the game, was present and said the moment "was a great one to witness." There were several presentations, including the unveiling of a banner that read: "Bob Knight NCAA men's all-time career victory leader - 880." Knight spoke to the crowd a handful of times, initially after being introduced by Hance. The chancellor said how much he appreciated Knight, and the coach reciprocated. "I appreciate you a lot more than the other guy," said Knight, referring to former chancellor David Smith, with whom Knight was involved in a much-publicized argument at a Lubbock grocery store. Some of the big names present Thursday didn't come back, but Knight's extended family was in full force.While looking uncomfortable only briefly during the ceremony, the cantankerous coach gave accolades to many -- including his wife, Karen, and Lubbock itself.
"I have great respect for the community where Karen and I really enjoy living," said Knight, whose team at one point led 33-13. "…The first 15 minutes of the game was Karen's game plan … the rest was mine, unfortunately. I say, 'Thank you, Karen.' " In a touch of irony, nearly two decades ago New Mexico men's basketball fans hoped Knight would help them make history instead of it being the other way around. Knight teased UNM by interviewing for its basketball coaching vacancy in 1988. He turned the offer down, however, to stay at Indiana and instead recommended his former assistant, Dave Bliss, who UNM then hired. Knight, who also hired ex-UNM coach Norm Ellenberger as an assistant at Indiana, came to Tech in 2001 after being fired by the Hoosiers in 2000. Knight, in his 41st year in coaching, has spent much of the season denying that he gave a hoot about the record. But by the more than half-hour postgame ceremony -- which included Knight getting choked up on a number of occasions -- it obviously meant something. "I've always been kind of a Frank Sinatra fan, of his music," Knight said to the media following the ceremony. "And I've always thought, if there's ever an occasion when a song should be played on my behalf, I wanted it to be Frank Sinatra singing 'My Way.' Because I don't expect you people to have agreed with what I've done. And if I did, I would have asked your opinion. I have never asked the opinions of very many. I've simply tried to do what I think is best. The way I think you have to do it, to do what's best. I think I put myself on the limb at times -- to get this kid to be the best player or the best student. "Regrets? Sure, just like the song, I have regrets. Not necessarily to have done things different -- I wish I could have done things better, at times. I wish I would have had a better way at times. "Like he said, I did it my way. When I look back on it, I don't think my way was all that bad."

7) From Mark Kreidler of the Sacromento Bee:

Emotional Knight - Bob Knight does show emotions other than anger and rage.

The Texas Tech head coach was adamant that passing Dean Smith wasn’t any big deal, but that was clearly a lie after watching him literally on the brink of tears in a postgame celebration on the court after earning the 880th win of his coaching career. Knight was overcome with emotion as Frank Sinatra’s My Way blared over the speaker system at United Spirit Arena. He was choked up standing on the court as confetti surrounded the arena, but then quickly turned back to the coach – talking about his players. Knight isn’t the only one glad it’s over. Those in the Knight camp are happy that the Texas Tech head man didn’t have to prolong the inevitable en route to his record-breaking 880th victory. The anti-Knight fans are also content now that they won’t have to hear from the white-haired coach from Lubbock anytime soon. The bottom line is that Knight was – and still is – a terrific coach. He won 880 games with just one NBA All-Star. He was successful in three different places – both on and off the court. He has a trio of national titles to his credit. He graduates his players and prepares them for life with and without basketball. In a day and age when coaches are more concerned with getting kids eligible at any cost, Knight’s focus is on getting the most out of his players and making certain they actually go to class. The words student-athlete are thrown around, but Knight makes his players earn it both on the court and in the classroom. Knight can say that the record doesn’t mean much to him, but that’s definitely not the case. All you had to do was look at his face on Monday afternoon. He didn’t want the march for the record to be a distraction for his current team, so he downplayed it. After the Red Raiders fought off New Mexico on New Year’s Day, Knight was first class. He actually let his guard down at times. He showed varying emotions and the world was able to see the softer side of the hard-nosed former Army coach. Knight brought current players and even his wife onto the court, then spoke highly of AD Gerald Myers and past players. Believe it or not, it’s rare that you’ll find one of his former players that doesn’t speak highly of Knight. There are guys like Neil Reed, but they are the exception. Knight is tough as nails and can be ornery, but he sticks by his guys. Although Knight will be the all-time winningest coach for the next decade or so, a former protégé, Duke’s Mike Krzyzewski, will likely pass him at some point. Coach K has 765 victories, is seven years younger, puts up 30 wins nearly every season and is still going strong. Knight, 66, has an average Texas Tech team that will be fortunate to get into the postseason. Knight’s legacy should be one about winning, but that’s not the case – at least not to the general public. Instead, he’ll be remembered for his outbursts – most notably the time he threw the chair onto the court in 1985.
What he should be remembered for is getting the most out of his kids – and that has absolutely nothing to do with basketball.