ShareThisBob Knight, in town to do color commentary for Thursday night's Purdue-Minnesota basketball game on ESPN2, might have become the Minnesota basketball coach had Tubby Smith not been available.
Not much was known at the time about the pressure being put on University of Minnesota President Robert Bruininks by some prominent alumni and top contributors to the basketball program that the university hire Knight to be the Gophers coach.
Big Ten Commissioner Jim Delany has never been a big Knight fan and he certainly wouldn't have encouraged the hiring of Knight, but if Bruininks could have been convinced, athletic director Joel Maturi would have gone along. However, when Smith became available, the pressure to hire Knight disappeared.
Knight still has a desire to coach after turning the Texas Tech job over to his son, Pat. If the right job was offered at a school where he has a chance to win, he'd be interested.
"Well, I like to coach," Knight said. "I like the part about getting ready to play, seeing if what we'd done is the right thing. I think I'd like to coach, but it would have to be something that was good. I mean, it'd have to be something that I like.
"I'll probably always miss coaching because I like the mechanics of basketball. I always liked to prepare -- if our defense could stop your offense, and if our offense could score against your defense -- that was really always enjoyable to me."
Believe me, he is a coaches' coach. Knowing him as well as I do, I know how other coaches worship this man and what a great coach and person he really is.
Like anybody else, he has made some mistakes. But we go back forever, and I could write a book about his good deeds.
Knight and Smith are good friends.
"I think he's done a very good job," Knight said. "I thought he was a good choice for the job. I got to know Tubby when he was at Kentucky and I really liked him. I respect the way he goes about things."
Knight is enjoying working for ESPN, something he didn't know whether he would like.
"It gives me a chance to watch basketball and, here and there, see a coach that I like," Knight said. "Just to kind of watch it as though I don't have anything at stake. I just enjoy watching teams play and seeing what they do. Things come up, like maybe a zone (defense), I watch how they attack the zone. Would they do it like I do it? Or do I do it differently?
"I'm enjoying it. The ESPN people have been really good, and I've enjoyed them immensely."
As for this season, Knight thinks the Atlantic Coast Conference and the Big East have more good teams than the Big Ten.
If you want some references about Knight, ask Tubby Smith what he thinks of Knight as a person and a basketball coach. You would get a very favorable reply.
(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)
columnMust credit Minneapolis Star Tribune
