Louisville place trail Rick Pitino, right, with Kentucky head bus topology John Calipari during the Final quartet game in New Orleans last March.(Photo: David J. Phillip, AP)
The 12 active subject title- sweet teaches in men's college basketball shake off bewitchn seismic changes in the game over the ago few decades.
Against the background of the 75th NCAA tournament, USA TODAY Sports offers long interviews with these dozen active title-winning coaches, all of whom still are head coaches at the Division I or II level. They provided a window into their e'er-changing world, offering perspective on several(prenominal) big-picture issues that affect modern-day college basketball.
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From former Villanova coach Rollie Massimino, who led the Wildcats to an improbable mount in 1985, to Kentucky coach John Calipari, whose journey to a national title last season seemed almost like an inevitability, these 12 coaches vary in personalities, philosophies and playing styles.
Here are some highlights of their answers on a variety of topics, including cheating in the game and whether they would fatality three one-and-done players on their aggroups:
1. Have you ever lost a recruit because you would not cheat?
zero(prenominal)th Carolina's Roy Williams: "I gravel do a lot of decisions in my life to not disturb involved in scenarios that I thought were loss to accident ugly at the end. There is no question that some decisions that stir been made surprised me, and I animadvert that is a better way that I would like to answer that."
Syracuse's Jim Boeheim: "If you asked 25 coaches, they will all recite that they did at some time, my guess would be. And probably of those 25, more than one of them probably cheated."
Former Kentucky coach Tubby Smith: "I've got to say yes. Yes. Plain and simple, because somebody asked me for something and I didn't do it and they went somewhere else. It's beyond third-parties straight off. It's a freakin' entourage."
Former Kentucky coach Rick Pitino: "I was blown away. In all my years, no one had ever asked me for anything. And it happened for the first time three years ago. Shook their bridge player and said to them, 'This is over.' We left my basement, where the families were gathering on a visit. I said, 'Best of luck to you.' A coach who gives anything to a player is now being bought and he can ne'er discipline the player. He is outlet to live in fear every darkness he puts his head down on the pillow that something is difference to come out on what he did. To me, that's something I never want to go through."
Former Villanova coach Rollie Massimino: "I have never cheated, OK, knowingly … But I know of people who were illegitimately recruiting, let's put it that way."
2. Which will we see first: A No. 16 over a No. 1 seed, or a double-digit seed winning the national title?
Pitino: "A double-digit winning the whole thing. If a 16 is ever going to beat a 1, it will be this year. But I do believe a double-digit could win the whole thing."
3. What was the silk hat college team you saw the past 25 years?
Kansas' eyeshade Self: "I say Vegas in '90. I wouldn't say the Duke team in '99 that lost to UConn was that far off. If we were 42 points better, we would have beaten them in the second round when I was at Tulsa."
Former Kansas coach Larry Brown: "The Detroit Pistons. They played like a college team."
4. What was the delineate characteristic of your last title team?
Boeheim: "They did not get to they could not beat a veteran Kansas team or a veteran Texas team. So they went out and beat them."
Pitino: "In modern day, I thought that (1996 Kentucky) team was the most beat out team in college basketball. I don't hypothecate there was a team that came along as good as that in the last 30 years. They were just a machine, where the second whole on that team could have had a great chance of winning the national championship."
5. The game is facing several issues – realignment, come up transfer rates, third-party influences – how concerned are you, if at all, about the boilersuit health of the game?
Duke's Mike Krzyzewski: "I have said, rightfully since 1990, that we should have somebody in charge of college basketball low the NCAA umbrella who watches this, who leads college basketball on a day-to-day backside … College basketball cries for that."
Smith: "I just conjecture you're going to see a restructuring of the whole system. The NCAA, their authority is being challenged every day. If you're not part of a football major conference, you are in a world of hurt."
Pitino: "I think we have done some great things in terms of deregulating the rules. It is going to stop the cheating of people having two phones and doing all these things that coaches have gotten caught for and paid the penalty.
Brown: "Realignment sucks. It is absurd to me."
6. Would you want to coach a team that had at least three guaranteed one-and-done players?
Kentucky's John Calipari: "First of all, a lot of guys will say (they are reluctant to coach one-and-done players) because they can't recruit those types of kids. To justify it, they'll say, 'I couldn't do it. I need kids for quaternary years.' Those other kids don't want to come and play for you. That's just how it is. Secondly, it all depends on how you recruit the kids. Are you making outlandish promises and commitments?"
Pitino: "I wouldn't care … But I don't go in the lieu and say, 'You're a one-and-done and my program is a one and done program.' I don't do that … One of the things I enjoy is building relationships with guys, and I don't want to get to know them for seven months and they move on because I never get to know them."
Former Michigan coach Steve Fisher: "Those who say they wouldn't probably can't recruit them. There is a lot of truth to that. There is not anybody in the States that wouldn't take really good players. But I think we all pass on good players that are wary kids."
Massimino: No. No, I would not. In fact, at Villanova for 19 ½ years, we never had a junior college player … We loved four-year players."
7. What advice would you give a young coach entering the profession now?
Calipari: "As long as you care about the kids you will evermore have a job."
Williams: "You are going to have to have thicker skin because you were criticized a hundred years ago except nothing like you are criticized now … Everyone in the world thinks they can be a basketball coach or a golf course superintendent.
Boeheim: "It is a tough business. It's a great business, but my son wants to be a coach. He is 14. I said, 'Just find something else, really.' … I would discourage people from getting in it."
Fisher: "Whatever job you have, that's the best job in America. So many times, you go to the Final Four, and everybody has resume in hand and can't wait to get to the next job. I think you are abusing the profession and shortchanging the program you are in and, really, yourself."
Michigan State's tom Izzo: "I think social media has had a serious impact. You have to figure out how to deal with it. I do not think it's easy. I'm an anti-(social media) guy, not because of old school or bran-new school. It's because of right school or wrong school. … The relationship with your players and convert them that you have their best interest in mind, not your program's even."
Florida's billystick Donovan: "Your whole entire life, you're chasing this trophy, this crystal ball. At the end of the day, it doesn't lick any value to your life. That's probably the biggest thing I've learned. There's an illusion created by society, whoever it may be, that if you do this, you will be somebody. You'll be of significance. You'll be of importance. ... It's an illusion. It's the biggest thing that destroys people's lives in a way."
Contributing: Nicole Auerbach
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Materials taken from USA Today
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