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davidson
11-29-2017, 12:55 PM
I've read a lot about Lefty over the years - and this is one of the best pieces of them all. Never knew that he chose Duke over Tennessee because he couldn't be married as a student at UT, but could at Duke. Really worth your time to read this. Plenty of Coach K quotes included.

https://theathletic.com/167659/2017/11/29/the-case-for-lefty-driesell/

BD80
11-29-2017, 12:57 PM
... he couldn't be married as a student at UT, ...

Unless it was to a sibling or cousin ...

ipatent
11-29-2017, 12:58 PM
Best coach to never make the final four.

Olympic Fan
11-29-2017, 01:28 PM
I've read a lot about Lefty over the years - and this is one of the best pieces of them all. Never knew that he chose Duke over Tennessee because he couldn't be married as a student at UT, but could at Duke. Really worth your time to read this. Plenty of Coach K quotes included.

https://theathletic.com/167659/2017/11/29/the-case-for-lefty-driesell/

Agreed ... great story. I kept reading it, wondering if Kindred had gotten everything -- the invention of Midnight Madness, the great 1974 ACC title game, the tragedy -- for Lefty -- of Charlie Scott.

Allow me to add one personal story.

It's 1983 at the ACC Tournament in the old Atlanta Omni. It's late night, about an hour after the last game of the day. Maryland had lost to Georgia Tech in overtime in the final game. a crushing defeat for the third-seeding Terps.

About a half-dozen reporters were standing there waiting for the bus to take us back to the hotel. We've been waiting a half hour and the bus (supposedly every 15 minutes) is nowhere in sight.

But Maryland's team bus is. The disappointed players are filing aboard when Lefty appears and sees us standing there. He asked what's happening and one of the writers tells him our dilemma.

"Ah hell," he says, "We'll drop you off."

He waves us aboard his bus and makes the driver detour to our hotel.

I'll never forget that. I can't think of another ACC coach I covered who would have done anything like that for the members of the media.

JStuart
11-29-2017, 01:28 PM
https://theathletic.com/167659/2017/11/29/the-case-for-lefty-driesell/

Has some good Coach K quotations as well.

75Crazie
11-29-2017, 02:26 PM
Best coach to never make the final four.
I always thought that Lefty was overrated as a coach. Great recruiter? Unquestionably. Media savvy and witty character? Undeniably. Great floor coach? Not so much.

ipatent
11-29-2017, 03:19 PM
I always thought that Lefty was overrated as a coach. Great recruiter? Unquestionably. Media savvy and witty character? Undeniably. Great floor coach? Not so much.

I don't think he was a great X and O guy either, but his overall achievements as a coach including recruiting were impressive. He'd be in the HOF right now with a final four or two, and he had teams that certainly were capable.

DukieInKansas
11-29-2017, 04:00 PM
Excellent article. I always loved watching Lefty enter Cameron to the many guys behind the visitor's bench wearing their bald caps. He would stop and sign them. Still makes me smile to think about it.

weezie
11-29-2017, 04:49 PM
^^^"The Lefthander" has a great sense of humor, most especially about himself. Very poignant and fine article.

RPS
11-29-2017, 05:10 PM
Excellent article. I always loved watching Lefty enter Cameron to the many guys behind the visitor's bench wearing their bald caps. He would stop and sign them. Still makes me smile to think about it.Excellent indeed.

In my day, Lefty's teams were great, led by Albert King and Buck Williams. There was always a sign in Cameron: "Richard Nixon: Duke's Second Biggest Mistake. Welcome Lefty!"

I hope it gets in the HOF and is alive and well enough to enjoy it.

NSDukeFan
11-29-2017, 06:19 PM
I take it this thread isn't about Phil Mickelson? :)

Reilly
11-29-2017, 11:16 PM
I take it this thread isn't about Phil Mickelson? :)

Nope -- it's about JD, Bagley, and Lefty.

GeneBanksManCrush
11-30-2017, 09:05 AM
Excellent article. I always loved watching Lefty enter Cameron to the many guys behind the visitor's bench wearing their bald caps. He would stop and sign them. Still makes me smile to think about it.

That's my memory too...20 or 30 Crazies in baldy caps.

accfanfrom1970
11-30-2017, 09:25 AM
That's my memory too...20 or 30 Crazies in baldy caps.

With a thermostat attached with needle in the red....I remember that from one game in the 70's.

dudog84
11-30-2017, 10:35 AM
With a thermostat attached with needle in the red...I remember that from one game in the 70's.

The one I remember is the gas gauge on empty...or was that Vitale?

BD80
11-30-2017, 04:00 PM
With a thermostat attached with needle in the red...I remember that from one game in the 70's.

Things were better in the 70s

arnie
11-30-2017, 05:14 PM
Things were better in the 70s

But not Duke b-ball.

MarkD83
11-30-2017, 07:46 PM
My favorite Lefty story has a connection to the latest Duke Magazine's article about the avuncular letter written to Duke students in the mid 1980s. In the article there is a reference to a Md game where Duke students did some rather inappropriate things to try to rattle Herman Veal. Several of the signs were rather crude...

After the game Lefty was asked if the signs upset him, his answer was classic, "No, I can't read...I graduated from Duke..." Perhaps in light of the unc scandal this story has a different connotation, but as a student at the time I did appreciate Lefty's ability to take a dig at the folks trying to get under his skin. Touche' Lefty..

BeachBlueDevil
12-01-2017, 09:38 AM
I live in the Virginia Beach/Norfolk area and a few years back on a now defunct sports radio station Lefty did a weekly radio show. It was only an hour long and some weeks it contained interviews with Coach K, Roy Williams, Gary Williams, Dick Vitale, Len Elmore, John Lucas and just about anyone you could think or you got Lefty story hour. The show was fantastic with his stories and interviews and you could tell with everyone he had on they revered him as both a man and coach.

#LeftyforHOF

alteran
12-01-2017, 10:17 AM
The one I remember is the gas gauge on empty...or was that Vitale?
That's how I remember it-- a gas gauge on empty for Lefty.

accfanfrom1970
12-01-2017, 10:39 AM
The one I remember had Lefty making some comment about coming to Cameron gave him a headache. I remember the temp in the read and some aspirin hitting the floor. I believe it was a Neil McGeachy coached game.

devildeac
12-01-2017, 10:49 AM
The one I remember had Lefty making some comment about coming to Cameron gave him a headache. I remember the temp in the read and some aspirin hitting the floor. I believe it was a Neil McGeachy coached game.

Another game where aspirin was displayed/thrown on floor (IIRC) was when one of the NCSU miscreants/student-athletes (can't recall who it was-Moe Rivers perhaps?) visited CIS after stealing a bottle of aspirin from a Raleigh store.