Pitino to Coach K: Why not try NBA?
Rick Pitino has done the college-to-pro shuffle. Twice.
He won with the Knicks. He lost with the Celtics. Since returning to college and reviving the Louisville program, he's said repeatedly that he's learned his place: on campus.
But Pitino looks at Mike Krzyzewski's dalliance with the Los Angeles Lakers and says, Why not?
"If there's one person in our game who left today for the pros and you'd say, 'OK,' it would be him," Pitino said Thursday night. "He's accomplished everything he'd want to accomplish in college basketball. Sometimes new challenges keep you young. What does he have to lose?
"For Mike Krzyzewski, unlike the rest of us (who went from the college game to the pros), this would be the way to do it. He'd be doing what Phil Jackson or Larry Brown did: taking over a great job, not one you have to build -- if they keep Shaq and Kobe."
Pitino also thinks recurring early losses to the NBA might affect Krzyzewski's decision. Losing Luol Deng after one season and Shaun Livingston before he got to Duke puts the Blue Devils in scramble mode.
"I think anybody in college basketball would be fed up with what's going on," said Pitino, who lost signees Donta Smith and Sebastian Telfair to the NBA draft as well. "College basketball as we know it will never be the same. Five or six years ago Duke was one of the few places holding on to its players, but now those days are over. So he's feeling what everybody else feels."
But Pitino's prediction is that Krzyzewski stays in Durham, N.C.
"I don't think he'll do it," he said. "He'll go back, look in the mirror and say, OK. But that may be because he's not an LA-type guy more than not being an NBA-type guy.
"The only bad thing about this would be, who would take the Duke job? Following Mike Krzyzewski? That poor guy would be the most courageous man on Earth."
Pat Forde of the Louisville Courier-Journal is a regular contributor to ESPN.com
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