What is, and might've been for Pitino
Posted: Friday, December 07, 2007 9:38 AM
Filed Under:
Coaches, Big East
Nothing like a victory milestone to prompt stories about the coach involved. Then again, who needs an excuse when it’s Rick Pitino?
The Louisville coach could earn his 500th career win on Saturday, a nice round coaching milestone any way you slice it.
(Quick aside: A win won’t be easy. Dayton (6-1) did beat Louisville last season and is currently ahead of the Cardinals in kenpom.com’s RPI – 14 to the Cards’ 19 – and has a 63-62 win over Miami (Ohio), perhaps the MAC’s best team. Yes, the same Miami team Louisville beat 47-44. The Cards get the edge since they’ll be at home, but nothing’s for sure without David Padgett and Juan Palacios. I expect Earl Clark to be all over the court.)
If Louisville does win, Pitino would match Bobby Knight and St. John’s legend Lou Carnesecca for 12th fastest in reaching 500 wins. (Pitino’s record is 499-183, a .732 win percentage through 21 seasons.)
The guys ahead of him on that list include Adolph Rupp, Hank Iba, Jerry Tarkanian, Phog Allen, John Wooden, Dean Smith, Roy Williams, Don Chaney, Ed Diddle, Jim Boeheim and Bob Huggins. Coach K, John Thompson, Denny Crum, Lute Olson, among others, all needed more games.
If you compare him to other coaches through the same span of seasons, only Tark, Boeheim, Huggins, Crum and Nolan Richardson have more wins to start to their careers.
Most of that comes from the amazing run Kentucky had at the end of his tenure there, where the Wildcats went to back-to-back Final Fours, then another in Tubby Smith’s first season. Kentucky was 69-7 in Pitino’s last two seasons, 97-12 in the last three and 124-19 in the last four. For sheer wins, only Coach K’s late 90s Duke teams, Tark’s Running Rebs from the late 80s and Rupp’s Kentucky squad in the late 40s can best those numbers.
Pitino’s just as good in the NCAA Tournament, too. He’s won 74 percent of those games, 3rd best among active coaches. He’s also the only coach to take three different schools to the Final Four. In March, few coaches are better.
Pitino’s always been a winner, but that’s remarkable stuff. And that includes two NBA stints and a total rebuild at Kentucky.
So where would Pitino be without those trips to New York and Boston? The Louisville Courier-Journal’s Brian Bennett posed that question in his blog this week, estimating Pitino missed out on about 135 wins (a conservative guess) and maybe an NCAA title or two.
It makes college hoops fans like me grateful when college coaches spurn the NBA to stay in the NCAA.
Cheers to Pitino, whenever No. 500 does arrive, be it this Saturday or next Saturday against Purdue, or even later.
