Lenn Robbins
Duke and USA Olympic coach Mike Krzyzewski, who has won four NCAA Tournament titles and led the U.S. to two gold medals, visited the Incarnation School in Washington Heights last week to recognize students who have excelled in the National Association of Basketball Coach's Ticket to Reading program.
After his talk, Coach K sat down for an exclusive interview with The Post. He discussed a wide range of issues, including his thoughts on Notre Dame joining the ACC, the possibility of the five power conferences splitting from the NCAA and LeBron James's evolution into one of the greatest basketball players ever.
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Mike Krzyzewski
Q: You decided early in high school you wanted to be a high school basketball coach and teacher. How do you explain the success you've had?
A: It worked out, the basketball gods were good.
Q. Do you like the newly constructed ACC?
A: I like it because I thought the ACC was in a lot of trouble with all this conference realignment. Like a number of conferences, we were very vulnerable, and in a few months with the addition of those teams and the [media] grant rights restriction, we've become a great conference in this new world.
Just like a company, a company could be a great company and the world changes. Unless that company adapts, you're out of it. I think that's still what's happening with conferences.
In our conference, the impetus for it was not basketball. But what's occurred is we now have the best hand at the table for basketball in the country. Our conference is ahead of the others.
Q: Did the ACC sell its basketball soul when it added Miami, Virginia Tech and Boston College (in 2004-05)?
A: I don't know [about] selling our soul. I just think our conference was looking for ways to get better and they were somewhat myopic in their approach. In other words — football!
I'm not saying you shouldn't look at that, but when you throw a stone into a pond you don't just get a splash, you get ripples. And if you're making decisions for the splash sometimes the ripples can get you.
I still think so much of this is everyone is throwing a stone for one reason and then you hope the ripples work out. For us, again, I don't think the impetus was to create a great basketball conference. We're lucky that the ripple turned out to be that way.
Q: Is it inevitable that the five super conferences (the ACC, Pac 12, Big Ten, Big 12 and SEC will have 64 schools in 2014-15) will split away from the NCAA?
A: Look, one of the main reasons people are doing this is for the money, right? The main reason. So those conferences are going to have the opportunity to earn much more money than any other conferences.
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