During his Friday morning press convention, Patriots coach Bill Belichick honored Bob Knight, a longtime buddy and legendary basketball coach who died Wednesday at age 83.
“I had a good relationship with Coach Knight. Very sad, the last few years have been tough,” Belichick stated. “I met coach Knight after I was in all probability below 10, recognized him my complete grownup life. He and my dad had been good buddies and coach (Bill) Parcells, so I noticed a number of coach Knight. Learned lots from him, loved my time with him.
“Wonderful man, and obviously a great coach, up there in the big five in basketball. Mike (Krzyzewski) kind of in from the same tree with (Adolph) Rupp and (John) Wooden. Unfortunately, tough loss for coaching.”
Knight was among the many most profitable and controversial coaches in faculty basketball historical past. He gained 902 profession video games between Army, Indiana and Texas Tech. He additionally led the United States males’s basketball crew to Olympic gold in 1984.
Knight met Parcells in 1966, when Parcells was employed to be Army’s new linebackers coach and Knight took over as the varsity’s new head basketball coach. The two grew shut and later grew to become mentors to Belichick.
Earlier this 12 months, Belichick revealed on Tom Brady’s SiriusXM podcast, “Let’s Go,” that he discovered to criticize all gamers equally from Knight. During their legendary 20-year collectively, it grew to become recognized that Belichick would berate Brady in crew conferences, at the same time as Brady was on a path to changing into the best quarterback of all time. Belichick stated making an instance of him was intentional.
“Where I got that from was Coach Knight, because Coach Knight told me that’s what he did with Michael Jordan on the Olympic team,” Belichick stated. “He said, ‘Michael, I’m going to rip your (expletive) because I can’t rip some of those other guys without ripping you.’”
He later added: “Players, they’d always come back to me and say, ‘Hey, the first meeting Belichick got on Brady. I’m like, Christ, if he’s going to talk to Brady like that I’d better be straight. I know what’s going to happen to me.”
Source: www.bostonherald.com