Showing posts with label Texas Tech. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Texas Tech. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
Bad Knight for Texas Tech
Monday, March 3rd, 2008 is a night that newly appointed Texas Tech head coach Pat Knight would love to forget. Texas Tech traveled to Kansas and was shellacked. The final score was 109-51. This game set the bar for the worst loss in Texas Tech history, at 58. This is just one week after loosing to Texas A&M by 44, which was the previous mark. This game also set another the record for the greatest margin of victory in Big 12 Conference play. The margin of victory tied Kansas' seventh largest victory in school history. All but one of the Kansas Jayhawks scored, with six players in double figures. This victory over Texas Tech will give Kansas a perfect record at home this year, 20-0.
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
Goodbye Bobby - Bobby Knight Retires
When I saw the blurb last night about Bobby Knight's immediate retirement, like many sports fans, my first thought was "what happened now". With a career that has always been clouded in a bit of controversy over his temper and coaching style, I suppose that thought was inevitable. Maybe it shouldn't be.
I've never been a Knight detractor. Truth be told, I haven't really cared. Around Tobacco Road, Bobby Knight is the firey coach who bested Dean Smith's win record and once had an assistant on his staff named Krzyzewski (you can call him Coach K). If anything, I think the criticism of Coach Knight was mostly unfair. My high school football coach didn't just throw chairs and yell obscenities... I also saw him pick a kid up and hold him against a brick wall one time. And we were in high school. Maybe basketball players are different, but if we could take that in high school, then I don't see why the over-sensitive PC-police went after Coach Knight for less. Sure he expected a lot from his players, sure he let them know when he was displeased and they weren't giving their all. Should we expect anything less? Coach Knight also reportedly considered it his duty to mold boys into men and would do anything for them later in life. Yet that part of the story is often untold.
But it doesn't matter. Even though I dismissed much of the Knight criticism over the years I obviously hadn't forgotten, because I still thought he must have done something if he was retiring now. But from initial reports, things couldn't be further from the truth. Coach Knight always did things his way, controversy and criticism be damned. Apparently he wants to retire the same was he coached, on his own terms. After thinking about it over the weekend and discussing it with his wife, Bobby Knight retired Monday, effective immediately, and left the reigns to his son Pat. Virtually no other coach would leave like that, but then no other coach is Bobby Knight. The winingest coach in Division I men's college basketball retired, in the process securing a head coaching position for his son and continuing the mystic and controversy around his career. And when you think about that career in total, it couldn't have been done in a more perfect way.
Congratulations on a great career Coach Knight.
I've never been a Knight detractor. Truth be told, I haven't really cared. Around Tobacco Road, Bobby Knight is the firey coach who bested Dean Smith's win record and once had an assistant on his staff named Krzyzewski (you can call him Coach K). If anything, I think the criticism of Coach Knight was mostly unfair. My high school football coach didn't just throw chairs and yell obscenities... I also saw him pick a kid up and hold him against a brick wall one time. And we were in high school. Maybe basketball players are different, but if we could take that in high school, then I don't see why the over-sensitive PC-police went after Coach Knight for less. Sure he expected a lot from his players, sure he let them know when he was displeased and they weren't giving their all. Should we expect anything less? Coach Knight also reportedly considered it his duty to mold boys into men and would do anything for them later in life. Yet that part of the story is often untold.
But it doesn't matter. Even though I dismissed much of the Knight criticism over the years I obviously hadn't forgotten, because I still thought he must have done something if he was retiring now. But from initial reports, things couldn't be further from the truth. Coach Knight always did things his way, controversy and criticism be damned. Apparently he wants to retire the same was he coached, on his own terms. After thinking about it over the weekend and discussing it with his wife, Bobby Knight retired Monday, effective immediately, and left the reigns to his son Pat. Virtually no other coach would leave like that, but then no other coach is Bobby Knight. The winingest coach in Division I men's college basketball retired, in the process securing a head coaching position for his son and continuing the mystic and controversy around his career. And when you think about that career in total, it couldn't have been done in a more perfect way.
Congratulations on a great career Coach Knight.
Labels:
Bobby Knight,
College basketball,
NCAA basketball,
Texas Tech
Thursday, January 17, 2008
900 for Bobby Knight
Congratulations to Bobby Knight on his 900th win last night. Texas Tech topped Texas A&M 68-53. Bobby Knight has done wonders for Texas Tech basketball and even more for the University as a whole. But for me, it is a shame that he is not eclipsing this mark at Indiana.
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