Once A Knight's Enough

It's hard to imagine that anything would be going on in the world of sports the day after one of the biggest upsets in the history of the Super Bowl, but here goes: Bobby Knight, the winningest men's coach in major college basketball, has quit his job. His boss, Texas Tech chancellor Kent Hance, told The Associated Press. "I think Bob is through with coaching. I think he got to the point where it wasn't fun for him."
This is kind of interesting to me. Coaching is no longer "fun" for Bobby Knight. He arrived at Texas Tech in March 2001, six months after being fired by Indiana for what school officials there called a "pattern of unacceptable behavior." This behavior included hitting a policeman, throwing a chair across the court or being accused of wrapping his hands around a player's neck. One wonders just how "fun" playing for Coach Knight might be.
Still, he never gets in trouble for breaking NCAA rules, always has high a graduation rate and gave his salary back a few years ago because he didn't think he'd earned it. Bobby Knight's first NCAA title came in 1976 when Indiana went undefeated, a feat no team has accomplished since. In 1984, he coached the U.S. Olympic team to a gold medal in Los Angeles. From 1971-2000 his Indiana Hoosiers team went 662-239. If winning is the currency in sports, then he should feel good about what he has accomplished. If verbal and physical intimidation are just bonuses, then he can certainly go right ahead and rest on his laurels.
If he was unable to reach the NCAA tournament with his Red Raiders, and if he was unable to get away with the kind of aggressive, monomaniacal behavior he had made a practice at the University of Indiana, then maybe basketball just isn't "fun" anymore. But now it's time to put his legacy to bed, and why not use a few of his own words to send him off into the sunset? "If rape is inevitable, relax and enjoy it," he once told a somewhat mortified Connie Chug during an interview. If you don't care for that one, there's always this: “All of us learn to write in the second grade. Most of us go on to greater things.” Yes, and some of us coach basketball.