Legendary college basketball coach Bob Knight died at the age of 83, his family announced on Wednesday.
During Knight’s 42 seasons as a head coach, he influenced many great players who would later on become coaches like him.
One of those players was Mike Krzyzewski, whom Knight coached while at Army, and later brought on as an assistant at Indiana.
The former Duke coach released a statement regarding his former coach shortly after the news dropped.
“We lost one of the greatest coaches in the history of basketball today,” Krzyzewski said, via The Athletic’s Brendan Marks. “Clearly, he was one of a kind. Coach Knight recruited me, mentored me, and had a profound impact on my career and in my life. This is a tremendous loss for our sport and our family is deeply saddened by his passing. We offer our sincerest condolences to Karen, Tim, Pat, and their families during this difficult time.”
Coach K played at Army from 1966–69 with Knight coaching the entire time. Knight then went to Indiana in ‘71 until 2000, where he would go on to win three national titles. He finished out his coaching career at Texas Tech from 2001–08.
Krzyzewski went on to become the winningest NCAA Division I men’s basketball coach in history with 1,202 wins before he retired in 2021. Knight lands sixth on that list with 902 wins.
The two coaches went on to infamously face each other in the 1992 Final Four, in which Coach K’s Blue Devils beat Knight’s Hoosiers.
