In the final four of March Madness, the centennial rivals of the University of North Carolina and Duke University, the first meeting in the tournament became the masterpiece of legendary coach "Old K" Mike Shashevsky.
There is a beginning and an end, to the old K coach Duke's first career defeat in the North Carolina tar heel, in this game that is destined to go down in history, defeated the sworn enemy Blue Devils by a score of 81-77, so that the NCAA's first-in-class historical victory of the legendary coach, the coaching career can only end in one defeat.
But regardless of the outcome of the game, the old K, who announced in June 2021 that he retired after the end of the season, has long been unshakable in his historical position. He is the biggest winner in the history of American college basketball and has left a priceless legacy for Duke University and the sport of basketball.
Text / Fu Haonan
Editor / Yin Haonan
01
Old K's coaching
Known as "Old K," Mike Shashevsky is undoubtedly the most recognizable basketball coach outside the NBA.
Having coached at the NCAA for nearly half a century, he has the record for the most wins in college basketball history (1,202 games). K Sr. has been a Duke head coach since 1980 and has led the Blue Devils to five NCAA titles over a period of 42 years, winning the division championship 13 times in Crazy March to reach the final four (National Semifinals).
The scene where Old K cuts the Nets as a champion has been portrayed in the basketball memories of generations
Among Shashevsky's player disciples, 68 heard their names in the draft; after taking over the star-studded U.S. men's basketball team in the NBA as head coach, he also set brilliant records in international competitions: winning gold in three consecutive Olympic games, winning two consecutive FIBA basketball World Cup championships...
The old K, who was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 2001, has no regrets in his coaching career. His culminations in NCAA history may be comparable only to john Wooden, who is also legendary.
But for Old K himself, what he cares about most is the young people who have been guiding and educating him for more than 40 years.
Coach K's NBA disciples are full of talent
"The fundamental reason I've been coaching is the relationship with the players, in order to be able to make an impact on the lives of the young people I've had the privilege of coaching. When I was 16 years old, that's how my high school coaches and teachers influenced me and made me want to be a coach ever since." Old K said in an interview with the American Today Show.
That's why he chose to stay at Duke after receiving an olive branch from the OK group, LeBron and multiple NBA teams that year. The champion spirit and brotherhood (The Brotherhood) that the campus team has formed over the years is the result of his hard work and the most proud coaching achievement.
Old K's coaching style has long been deeply rooted in the hearts of the people: passionate, but extremely strict on the discipline and academics of players. Emphasis on team spirit – he will personally demonstrate how to compete for floorballs, sacrificing his body to create offensive fouls for the team, but also allowing players to use their talents and instincts in key moments (e.g. Christian Leitner, Tyes Jones).
Most importantly, make every team member believe in the coach and teammates, and thus shape their champion personality.
Knight (left) with Shashevsky, who was less than 20 years old, in 1966
In the 1960s, Shashevsky, who played point guard for West Point for three years, naturally had a coaching philosophy that was deeply influenced by the famous coach Bob Knight. However, compared to Knight, the "general" who leads the team and is harsh to the players to the point of cruelty, old K is more affinity for the players, he will not restrain when he reprimands the players, and can scold the star Jay Williams, but he can also wait by the hospital bed like a father after his car accident.
Old K, who had served in Dongdougawa City, the Korean Demilitarized Zone for three years, would demand that the players obey his orders like an officer and question whether they dared to go to war with him. But he also attaches great importance to the family concept of developing players, and it is his custom to invite recruited players to visit his home. Old K believes that the attitude of treating teammates like family is as important as the concepts of "five fingers forming a fist" and team responsibility.
Jon Sayer (right), who will succeed K as Duke manager next season, is one of the favorites who best fits his ideal image
And the players who came out of K's hands often proved the success of his ideas: Grant Hill, Sean Battier, Carlos Boozer, Johnny Dawkins, Bobby Hurley, etc. are all examples. Outstanding skills and ball quotient, big heart, tough defense, fighting enthusiasm, and leadership skills are all qualities that the old K coach is more or less possessed by his protégés.
In 42 years, 42 NBA first-round shows, Duke was one of the NCAA's well-deserved NBA DreamWorks, and old K was their golden signboard, attracting year after year of gifted high school students to join the Blue Devils.
On March 5, 2022, at the last game of K's coaching career at Cameron Arena, Duke's home stadium, a total of 96 former Blue Devils players appeared in the audience, cheering for the teachers and students like spectators. It is worth mentioning that NBA president Adam Xiaohua was also present, as a Duke '84 graduate, he witnessed the process of old K's initial struggle from struggling to leading the team to become a crazy three. Old K's loyalty to Duke has been rewarded with the same eager returns from generations of alumni.
Coach Old K's final game at Cameron's Arena, the farewells lined up in a long line
Many of the players he has coached often return to Duke after retiring as his assistant coaches, and then use this as a springboard for his coaching career. This is true of Quinn Snyder, Tommy Amek, Dawkins and others, as well as K's hand-picked Duke head coach successor, Jon Sayel, who was the absolute core of the 2010 championship-winning lineup.
In addition, there are former Duke players who have served in the management of the NBA: Elton Brand, Trajan Langton, Mike Dunlliver Jr. and Battier, who may also be promoted to general manager in the future. Although he has never dabbled in professional basketball, in the world of the NBA, the imprint of the old K can be seen everywhere, and the peach and plum are all over the world.
Old K's coach tree
And old K's coaching style is also applicable to the world's top basketball superstars, and the Dream Team is the best example.
02
Old K's Dream Team Memories
After being named manager of the U.S. men's basketball team in 2005, the pressure Shashevsky faced was self-evident.
He knows that he has left his comfort zone and cannot use the same set of reprimands and spurring college players to manage and constrain NBA superstars such as LeBron and Kobe Bryant. But he also understands that if the U.S. men's basketball team wants to win the Olympic gold medal, it must be twisted up and down into a rope, and he must play a key role in rallying people.
At first, Old K first tried to use his habitual way of psychological work and establish prestige: in the first meeting of the American team, he tried to use simple and rough words to stimulate the morale and sense of mission of the players - "You must xx really care about this!" He saw Howard mercilessly scolding "Warcraft" when he did not seriously defend the demolition during the warm-up game.
However, this set has no effect on the long-established professional stars, who are no longer "college students" who will be easily intimidated.
Under the guidance of old K, James became the dressing room leader of the AMERICAN men's basketball team
So, when the preparation period for the 2008 Olympics came for the "Redemption Team" of the United States, Shashevsky changed his methodology. He took the initiative to communicate with every player, especially leaders like Kobe, LeBron and Kidd, to build personal relationships. Whether it's a quick one-on-one interview or a plenary meeting, he takes the initiative to listen to the players' opinions on training, tactics, roles, etc., and puts forward their needs.
Through these exchanges, Old K truly grasped the personality and psychology of each player, and used his interpersonal skills to adjust and adapt to the way he communicated with them. It is worth mentioning that in terms of technology and tactics, old K has also made unprecedented changes.
A big believer in man-eye defense, he hired old friend and rival Syracuse University coach Jim Beheim to teach the U.S. men's basketball team a 2-3 defense he was proud of. Old K believes that under the rules of international basketball, the U.S. men's basketball team with a limited run-in period must learn to defend the area to make up for the lack of chemistry on the defensive end.
In the end, the U.S. men's basketball team truly believed that the coach, who had never coached an NBA team, under his leadership, became a winning division again. Three Olympic gold medals, two FIBA World Cup titles, and K's eleven-year national team coaching career have undoubtedly been successful.
After dealing with one of the top basketball players on the planet, the most valuable lesson Old K learned from it was to change, and to let go.
In fact, as early as the 1994-95 season, the old K, who was suffering from disc rupture and great pressure, almost retired early. At that time, he learned his lesson and realized that he could no longer respond to changes with no change, full control over every detail of the team from top to bottom, and this extreme control model was no longer sustainable.
As a result, he began to share more power with the assistant coach and hired more former players in the old department. Snyder, Dawkins, Steve Vojchekhovsky... Generations of Duke assistant coaches have been players who have helped K manage player relationships while also using Duke's platform to open up his coaching career.
Thanks to the changes taken by old K, the Duke men's basketball team has entered a virtuous circle of continuous evolution, becoming the "evergreen tree" of college basketball for nearly half a century. His coaching style has brought a steady stream of vitality to the team, his resume has become more brilliant with the success of his national team career, and his relationship with NBA players has become a magic weapon for admissions.
However, the old K, which is often associated with the words "great" and "legendary", also has a controversial and even disgraceful side.
03
The imperfect side of old K
In the 1980s and 1990s, K, who led Duke to the final four for five consecutive seasons, emphasized the development of young players into mature team leaders in their juniors and seniors, such as Hill, Leitner, Danny Feeley, and others. When Corey Margetti dropped out of the NBA draft early after his freshman year, the elder K believed that his choice was wrong and that Duke basketball should be greater than his personal career pursuits.
From 1991 to 1992, the two-time winning team of Hill, Hurley, Leitner and others is often considered to be the most classic lineup of the old K
However, as the NBA entered the 00s, freshman and even high school players more and more frequently started their careers in advance, the trend of college recruitment also changed significantly. The seniors and seniors occupy most of the playing time of the lineup, which is not attractive to the talented high school players, who want to go through the motions as soon as possible to enter the election, while using the NCAA platform to promote themselves and increase the market value.
Even if Old K once reiterated that Duke would not be a springboard for players to transition from high school to the NBA, he realized that it was time to keep up with the times, and that senseless stubbornness would only make Duke out of touch with the times.
Schools in Syracuse (Cameron Anthony), Memphis (Derek Ross, Terrik Evans), Kentucky (John Wall, Demarcus Cousins, Eric Bledsoe), Texas (Kevin Durant, LaMarcus Aldridge) and others continue to steal outstanding fresh blood. With a strong desire to win, he made a compromise in order to ensure the competitive strength of his team in the future.
In 2010, senior players such as Shayer, Brian Zubeck, Lance Thomas, Kyle Singler and other senior players remained the core of the championship Duke. But in 2011, with the addition of Kyrie Irving, Duke basketball officially entered a new era.
Although he spent only one season at Duke, Irving's relationship with K Sr. continued into the national team
Not counting injury games, Irving played only 11 games for the Blue Devils. That year, Duke, as the number one seed, was eliminated by the fifth seed Arizona in the sweet sixteen. Irving, who proved himself worthy of being a show in high school, unsurprisingly ran early. By old K's standards, such a season wasn't a success, but the trend of Duke basketball dominated by freshmen began.
After that, successive super-rookies put on their Blue Devils robes and left early: Austin Rivers, Jabally Parker, Jalil Okafor, Justus Winslow, Tyes Jones, Brandon Ingram, Jason Tatum, Marvin Bagley, Wendel Carter Jr., Gary Trent Jr., RJ Barrett, Zion Williamson, Cam Redish...
In the 2010s, Duke became the other "One and Done" school outside of Kentucky
As Old K subverts his past practices, the voice of doubt about him grows louder.
Some argue that he destroyed the tradition he had built at Duke for more than three decades, abandoning its essential spirit in order to maintain The Duke Basketball's championship brand;
It has been argued that Mad Three's multiple upset defeats by lower-ranked, more experienced seeded teams (12 years lehigh, 14 years Mosel, 17 years South Carolina, 19 years Michigan State, etc.) prove that new models that rely on talent are unreliable;
Even, some people questioned that the old K coach lost his insistence on maintaining player relations and player character in order to win and maintain Duke's brand image.
Rashid Suleiman, a five-star high school student recruited by Duke, was expelled in January 2015 after playing 90 games under Shashevsky. At the time, Suleiman was accused of sexual assault by two female students, but was not formally charged, and he himself firmly denied the charges. According to Suleiman, Duke stepped in to investigate the incident as early as March 2014, but found no evidence. However, Suleiman was still removed from the team in the middle of the 2014-15 season, becoming the first player in the history of coaching K to be expelled.
Suleiman became the first player in K's coaching career to be removed from the team
Old K believes that Suleiman can not be consistently up to Duke's standards on and off the court, and the latter also said that his expulsion has nothing to do with the previous scandal. But it is undeniable that this time, old K did not side with his players, but chose to draw a line with Suleiman without being convicted.
Suleiman's mother believes that her son is afraid to reveal too much for fear of offending the prominent old K coach and wants to protect his career prospects. But the wood has become a boat, and after this incident, Suleiman and his dream have gradually drifted away, and he is still wandering in overseas leagues. Shashevsky's quick-witted approach inevitably casts a shadow over the career of the former future star.
It must be mentioned that There are also The Stars of Duke Basketball, which many hate to the bone, led by Christian Lightner, JJ Redick and Grayson Allen. They have all achieved extraordinary things in the NCAA, such as the National Championship, Naismith Player of the Year, and so on. But they are also highly controversial: The arrogance and arrogance of Leitner and Redick during the Duke era, as well as the tolerance of old K, make Duke synonymous with "superiority" and the enemy of college basketball.
With a hot temper and small movements, Allen, who has deliberately stumbled on his opponent three times in a season, has become a thorn in the eyes of fans across the United States. But old K only gave him a one-game ban after Aaron's harsh performance. Old K, who has always emphasized the character and discipline of the players, inevitably attracted "hypocrisy" and "short protection" for himself.
Allen, Lightner, and Redick are widely regarded as Duke's "darkest big three."
No one is perfect, but in a competitive sport where the winner is king, the champion can erase almost all criticism.
In 2015, the troika of freshman rising stars Okafor + Winslow + Jones helped Duke win his fifth championship in team history. Old K is once again a winner in the new era.
More importantly, no matter what his career review ultimately determines, old K has left a priceless legacy for Duke University and basketball.
04
The end of the legend
According to Yahoo, Duke ranked second with nearly $35.49 million in the NCAA men's basketball team revenue rankings, second only to the University of Kentucky. At the same time, with the NCAA lifting the name, image and portrait rights (NIL) restrictions on athletes in July 2021, the economic benefits of Duke's player status have also become a new advantage for team admissions.
Five-star high school guard Gerald McCain was worth $286,000 before announcing his joining Duke basketball, Fansided reported. When he confirmed he would be wearing the Blue Devil suit, that number rose to $397,000, and his social media platform traffic has also increased significantly, and now it has soared to more than 1.2 million TikTok followers.
All this shows the fact that the old K has been operating for more than forty years, making the Duke men's basketball team one of the most recognizable and valuable college sports brands in the United States, standing in an invincible position in the college sports market.
As a result, Sr. K was able to enjoy the final journey of his coaching career with peace of mind, and one of the youngest squads he has ever coached has brought him pure joy.
Ban Kairo is one of Old K's "closed disciples"
Sweet Sixteen, facing more experienced, once reached the final texas tech. Duke's youngsters didn't back down, and in the final moments of the game, they firmly told the old K, who had previously placed the area defense: "We want to keep an eye on people.". Old K chose to believe in his players and let them win the game. After the game, he proudly commented on Love General Paul Banquero in a hoarse, choked voice: "Oh my God, that guy was actually taught by me!"
Ban Kairo, Jeremy Roach, A.J. Griffin, Mark Williams, Trevo Chills, Wendel Moore Jr. and others failed to help him end his career with a championship like Coach Wooden. But it was their growth that really made him proud.
Although I have never been a Duke fan, after this morning's explanation of the game, looking at the figure of old K who is reluctant to leave the court, I have to admit that he is the greatest winner in the history of college basketball.
In this article, I would like to pay tribute to Mike Shashevsky. I wish you and your family, Mickey, Debbie and others peace of mind and enjoy retirement.
"I'm the luckiest coach in the world."
Yes, you really are.
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