Coach K not the best coach?

[SilkyJ]

The problem with your logic is that from 86 to 94, Duke's peak years, all of your mentioned "weaknesses" about Coach K were still true. When has he ever played a lot of zone, for instance? Man-to-man has always been K's staple.

The other problem with the logic is that K has had 9 defensive players of the year, which is 3 times more than the next best coach. Clearly the guy knows a thing or two about defense.

Also dukemom's statement about the zone working well with "the players he's had in the last few years." That doesn't even make any sense. We've had lock down defenders like C Du, Dockery, and Ewing, and had Sheld down low and before that we had Battier. All of them excel in Man-to-man (obviously sheld would work well in a zone, too)

[gvtucker]

Well, I think he hasn't utilized his players properly. He continues to stick to his 6-7 man rotation when he has 8-10 experienced, viable players sitting on the bench. He doesn't use the backdoor cut, even though he has the players to excel with that. He hates the 2-3 zone, even though that can work miracles with the players he's had in the last few years.

He often "sticks with the game plan" even when it's NOT WORKING.

Okay, I sound like a K basher. I'm not. I LOVE Coach K. I idolize K. I'm just trying to be realistic about my concerns from 2002-2007. GO DUKE. GTHCGHT

1. Duke used the 2-3 zone often this year, almost always when the other team had the ball out of bounds under the basket.

2. Duke's game plan changed significantly on offense this year. We got away from the high post pick that has been so effective in the past, mostly because this played to neither Paulus nor McRoberts strengths. By the end of the year, our problems weren't on offense, they were on defense.

I see the other criticisms potentially valid, though I might disagree somewhat, but that scarcely rises to the level of "really stupid", don't you think? For example, not using a backdoor cut is a rather minor detail. If a team doesn't run a certain version the Princeton offense, you don't see the backdoor cut as a regular part of the offense. Duke isn't alone in that respect.

[greybeard]

Of the top 10, I see Pintino and Calipari as being misplaced. Snake oil salesmen.

The K man, to me, sets a different standard than the other top 10ers. something about the choices he makes, and the development of players that he facilitates, that is different. The other two mentioned that, to me, seem to share those qualities: JTIII and Beilein.

The others have wonderful programs at wonderful places with big arenas and beautiful babes, and can all "coach em up," as the old ball coach likes to put it. Sooo?

Did any of you catch when I think it might have been the fireman asked something like, "If you had gotten one or two of them that you just missed, do you think it would be fair to say that you would be in a class by yourself just behind Wooden?" If you didn't, K said something like, "If I ever care about such things, somebody should punch me in the face." Some things are priceless!

[rsvman]

...(2) Duke started shooting a lot more 3s (this is the only strategical change I've noticed over the years and, imo, is the reason why there's been a tendency since 1995 for Duke to build and blow huge leads

This is an interesting thought, but I'm not sure it's true. For one thing, I don't have the stats to show whether we are really taking more 3-pointers or not. Certainly we did when JJ was around, but that decision is hard to second guess, is it not?

From the standpoint of scoring points, you'd have to have be one-third again more accurate from 2-point land than you are from 3-point land in order to favor the approach of shooting 2-pointers exclusively or almost exclusively. Many teams shoot close to 40% from 3-point land. So, that team would have to shoot 60% or more from 2-point land in order to make shooting 2's worthwhile, and in order to do that, a lot of the shots would have to be layups, slams, or other deep in the paint shots.

I personally think that the 3-point shot rule is a two-headed monster; one the one hand it makes basketball games more entertaining, but on the other hand it has really ruined (in some ways) the game of basketball I grew up watching. (I'd like to go on about this but it is tangential to this discussion. I've been thinking about starting a thread about the "state of the game" for quite some time. Maybe I'll do that within the next few days.) In the meantime I'll just conclude by saying that to me it's not clear that over-reliance on the three has been one of Duke's problems in the past few years.

[Troublemaker]

Oh, there's actually no doubt that Duke takes more threes in the post-95 era. I'm too lazy right now to break it down per game right now (or, more preferably, per possession), but you can look at the overall season totals here: http://goduke.statsgeek.com/basketball-m/seasons/

If you look season by season chronologically through the K era, you'll notice a sudden spike in three-pt attempts in 95 that has pretty much been maintained over the past dozen years or so.

Anyway, my point really wasn't to argue that shooting more threes has contributed to Duke's relative decline in postseason results (although I do believe it contributes). My point is just that if someone is going to complain about K's stupid decisions from 02-07, they should probably pick some examples that weren't also K's choices from 86-94. Unless they can argue that times have changed and those choices are no longer valid because of x, y, and z.