NCAA Basketball: Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski retiring, why?

The College Basketball landscape is quickly and as Arizona Basketball has gone through recent changes, soon Duke will have to replace Mike Krzyzewski.

In April 2021, Arizona Basketball moved on from Head Coach Sean Miller in a somewhat surprising move due to the timing and his ability to continue to recruit great talent. Miller had one year left on his contract and had a pretty good core of players returning that he was developing (as opposed to coaching one-and-done players).

Nearly two months later, there is more news in College Basketball with another eye-opening coaching move with another NCAA Blue Blood program. The latest? Duke’s Head Coach Mike Krzyzewski announced his retirement. But why does Coach K want to retire now?

Arizona Wildcats

Let’s go over some recent NCAA Basketball concerns, program changes, and investigations.

Miller started his Arizona career in 2009, twelve years ago, and led the team to seven NCAA Tournament appearances. He suffered from the ESPN and FBI drama, with the focus solely being on the Arizona Basketball program.

Over the past couple of years, there has been lots of speculation about Sean paying players, even though there was no proof, nor was he never indicted. ESPN sports broadcasters, like Dick Vitale, are huge Duke and Coach K fans.

I wouldn’t be surprised if they were trying to help their buddy ASU Head Coach Bobby Hurley gain some prominence in the Pac-12, and in some ways, he did, more than he would have without the constant ESPN mudslinging. But I digress…

Anyways, back to the topic at hand, it seems like there has been corruption elsewhere in college basketball too, with little thought given.

Over the past year or so, Kentucky Basketball gave Head Coach John Calipari a 10-Year contract in 2019 that lasts through 2029 worth $86 million (including an option to step down in 2024-25 season and become special assistant to the AD).

Ironically, also in April 2021, Kansas Basketball followed in Kentucky’s footsteps giving Head Coach Bill Self a lifetime contract. The athletic department ignored the fact that there is potential proof that their Head Coach Bill Self may have broken numerous NCAA rules by texting Adidas representative T.J. Gassnola regarding a new contract with the vendor and help getting a player to commit. Here are some of the texts between the two according to CBS Sports:

"“In my mind, it’s KU, Bill Self. Everyone else fall into line. Too (expletive) bad,” Gassnola replied. “That’s what’s right for Adidas basketball. And I know I’m right. The more you have lottery picks and you happy. That’s how it should work in my mind.”“That’s how ur (sic) works. At UNC and Duke,” Self replied."

If true, this is much worse than the nothing-burger the NCAA found on Miller, yet Arizona fired Miller and Kansas doubled down in support of Self, although they do have an out if they fire him for cause.

Duke’s Head Coach Mike Krzyzewski announced his retirement along with other eye-opening coaching moves by the NCAA Blue Blood programs. But why does Coach K want to retire now?

University of North Carolina’s legendary head coach Roy Williams announced his retirement also in April. Williams coached the Tarheels for 18 seasons, accumulating a total of 903 wins in his 33 seasons (485 with UNC and 418 with Kansas). According to USA Today, Williams retired because,

"“He [Williams] has been increasingly frustrated recently with the direction of college basketball. With the NCAA about to grant players a one-time free transfer and the liberalization of name, image, and likeness rights that will allow players to cash in on marketing deals, the days of any program”"

Or, in other words, it won’t be easy moving forward to win as much as he has grown accustomed to in the past. And, the entire landscape of AAU to College to Pro basketball has changed a lot, making it even harder to navigate and be successful.

Former Louisville Head Coach Rick Pitino was fired when the proof came out that he was okay with arranging $100,000 for a recruit according to ESPN. As a result, Pitino went to go coach overseas, then was rewarded after a few years getting hired back into the NCAA by Iona University who included a high buyout in his one-page contract.

Pitino was found to be responsible for the Cardinal’s prostitute scandal in 2017 and was suspended for five conference games. At one point, Pitino was extremely vocal about how his job recruiting got easier as soon as he figured out it was all about the shoes. Pitino also started to see recruiting becoming harder, he even had an idea how to change recruiting:

Why do we bring all this history up? Because NCAA basketball and recruiting have changed; it’s getting harder and harder to recruit and cheat. It’s also harder to get five-star/one-and-done recruits, train them in a short amount of time to transition from AAU ball to college ball, and win the NCAA Tournament. Add in the FBI interest in exposing Nike and now Adidas’ involvement in the whole recruiting machine, and the temperature is rising.

This brings us to Duke’s Coach K. Coach K is a storied coach in the NCAA:

"Duke’s head coach since 1980, and over his 40-year career with the Blue Devils, he has accrued five national championships and 1,170 wins, the most of any Division I college basketball coach."

According to Dave Dewitt (NPR), Krzyzewski stated that his reason for leaving:

"Krzyzewski, the winningest college basketball coach ever, said the reason he chose to announce his retirement now, effective at the end of next season, was simple – to allocate his time better and not to make a promise to an incoming player he might not be able to keep.Krzyzewski referred frequently to the importance of his family and being able to adapt."

But there may be a few more reasons for Coach K to retire after next season. Even though Christian Dawkins stated or led folks to believe that Duke has the cleanest basketball program in the NCAA, there may be reports of some foul play.

One recent player who suffered from post-college reporting of possible violations was Marvin Bagley whose father is rumored to have accepted $44,000 and lived in a $750K+ mansion in North Carolina after Nike started sponsoring his dad’s AAU team. Just recently, Zion Williamson was also rumored of receiving regular payments from Adidas while at Duke:

In addition, there are also allegations submitted to the NCAA for many more players, some from the Pac-12, that received money from ASM Sports (Dawkins firm) including Kyle Kuzma (Utah), Bennie Boatwright (USC), and Markell Fultz (Washington).

So does Coach K want to retire because he wants to spend time with his family? He did say in his public announcement that it wasn’t because of health, Coach K is 76 years old. Perhaps it is the changing landscape and the programs’ recent downward trend?

Duke’s record last season was13-11 and the team missed the tournament. Certainly lackluster for such a storied program. Even worse, he lost seven of his top 11 players from this season for next season, and the grandfather of 10 will have an uphill battle as he is gunning for another NCAA Championship. That said, an era will soon be over.

Personally? I think Coach K may be feeling the heat from the possible allegations, and also wants to get out on a high note without his reputation getting muddied. It’s getting harder and harder to do that for these older coaches who may not be able to relate to and develop the new Generation Y players.

The new young crew of head coaches including Arizona’s Tommy Lloyd will have the chance to make a name for themselves, and hopefully lead clean programs moving forward in an ever-changing NCAA basketball world.