thoughts from the mind of Jon Pessah

Ok, seems odd to be writing about K on the night Kansas staged a historic comeback to win the title. Feel bad for Memphis kids, blowing a nine point lead, but have little sympathy for John Calipari, who strikes me as far too big a self promoter. Memphis was World Wide Wes' team (read this in Saturday's NYT for story on the most powerful person in basketball http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/05/sports/basketball/05wesley.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&ref=sports&pagewanted=all). I'm sure he has connections in Kansas, too, but Coach Cal is his guy.

Things got a little more complicated for Mike Krzyzewski, who took another hit on the road to recovery when Taylor King transferred out of Duke last week. Several people at Duke say there are three other kids thinking of getting out, which is no surprise. K seemed to lose interest at the end of the season when he lost to Miami and Wake Forest. I think he knew then this team had little chance in the NCAA, and lost focus. Rumors are that he turned on the team in the lockerroom after the game. King follows Josh McRoberts as big time AAU players who left Duke feeling ill about the program, and that will not help K’s recruiting.

Now there will be a new athletic director at Duke, replacing Joe Alleva, who owed his job to his relationship with K. Alleva was exposed as a weak administrator by the Duke lacrosse case, and was marginalized. He left for LSU, in all likelihood because he knew his time was limited at Duke, despite a contract extension. The big question will be who Duke can bring in and if that person can handle K, who has run his own kingdom for a long, long time. Duke just hired a new football coach and is planning to invest much more in football, which has been an embarrassment for the school. Bringing in an AD with a football background would be a big statement to K about where the school is heading.

So, the question becomes how long K stays in a situation where he can not win as he once did. At 60, that just doesn’t sound all that appealing. K is being criticized again for spending too much on the Olympics and not enough on Duke, and more than a few people around him say that he talks more about the NBA players on his team than about the college kids on his Duke team. Interesting.