Ray Glier

For a guy with 902 wins, more than any other college basketball coach, Bob Knight sure leaves the game with little clout.

It was his idea six years ago to revoke scholarships for programs that did not adequately push kids toward graduation. Did he get any credit now that the NCAA has adopted the policy? Not much that I’ve seen.

With Memphis steaming toward an unbeaten regular season using its unconventional “attack, attack, skip, attack” offense, you wonder what Knight thinks of an unbeaten team that can’t shoot straight. I don’t know. Nobody’s asked him as far as I’ve seen. It would be a good story considering he had the last team to run the table (1976 Indiana).

Are reporters going to be able to walk up to him at coach’s conventions and ask about the state of the game? Doubtful.

Is it okay to phone Knight and get a …. no, it’s not okay.

The guy should be on a pedestal right now, next to John Wooden and Dean Smith, but his unpleasantness spoils things. Worse, the winningest coach in college basketball isn’t even as relevant today as a coach who retired 33 years ago, Wooden.

Knight has more wins than anybody and a long coaching tree behind him, but as this sour guy leaves there are too many people saying, “Good riddance.”

Is that anyway to treat an icon?

If he choked a kid, threw a chair, taunted his bosses, sued his school, berated fans, picked on people, yes, it is.

If he quits on the school that gave him a second chance, yes it is. Knight got to 900 wins and folded up. Texas Tech still has plenty of season left and he quit. Just one more layer of tarnish.

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I saw a stat where he graduated more than 80 percent of his players at Indiana when the national average was closer to 40 percent. He won three national titles with players as students at IU, which is unthinkable in today’s game where the best players do not get close to a degree.

That is why it is unthinkable that Knight can leave behind a legacy rich with benchmarks and still be reviled.

His career has been so contrary the medal to reward him has not been invented yet. How do you get sun and rain in the same picture?

You are an admirer and hater at the same moment. Spacing, screens, motion offense. That’s what should be left behind, not the memories of all the ridicule he shoved at people, all the disrespect.

It’s fair for me to dissect the guy like this because he made our jobs harder than they had to be. We didn’t throw the chair or choke the kid; we just reported it.

Were the press conferences that came with insulting comments all an act, or just pure animosity? Mostly, an act, I’m sure, but reporters are on deadline and yearned for a quote, not a stage act.

Mike Miller's college hoops blog Knight’s lasting legacy? The quotes, TV clips

A lot of the Knight garbage was contrived, which made it even harder to put up with. At least when we got the non-cuddly Bill Belichick we knew it was real unpleasantness.

Knight coached 42 years and besides winning three national titles, he turned around the Big Ten and made it watchable basketball in the 70s. Pre-Knight, the Big Ten was combat, then Indiana started scoring points and making plays with the ball to advance the game, not set it back to the Stone Age.

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He graduated players and his recruiting tact was legendary. He told a member of Isiah Thomas’ family he was taking the kid out of Chicago so they didn’t mess him up. Thomas signed with IU and became famous.

He would do decent things and then, just like that, pick on somebody, just because he could.

His teams took good shots, shared the ball, got every crumb of talent out of their game. And then he would ruin it with his spikes of foul mood.

Just human? I suppose. But I always kept asking myself, “Why the attitude, you jerk?”

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