FanHouse BobKnight

March Madness is heating up, so if Bob Knight is on ESPN talking about athletes who have impressed him, he must be talking about college basketball players, right? Not quite. In an appearance on ESPN Wednesday, Knight said that, in reality, he believes the best athletes in the country right now are not American basketball players but a visiting troupe of Russian skaters.

Every year, Selection Sunday officially kicks off the beginning of March Madness. Usually, the three-day lull between the release of the almighty brackets and the actual beginning of games is marked by complaining, whether it's Memphis not getting a No. 1 seed -- which is going to end up being the best thing that ever happened to the Tigers, by the way -- the Big Ten or Pac-10 being allegedly overrated, or the dwindling of mid-major entrants. It's always something.

Still, we can put up with that. Debate and discussion are good things. There is one suggestion, however, that is so absurd I'm almost embarrassed to dignify it: Some people, including several predominant commentators, want to expand the tourney field to 128.

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As the buzzer sounded in Conseco Fieldhouse early Thursday evening, the Indiana Hoosiers had lost to Penn State by a count of 66 to 51. Tom Crean's first season as head basketball coach had mercifully concluded. The Hoosiers will miss the NCAA Tournament for only the third time since A Season on the Brink was published. They will miss any sort of postseason play for the second time since 1977. In fact, this was -- statistically speaking -- the worst team in Indiana basketball history.

The funny thing? I was much more relieved when last season ended, and I guarantee I'm not alone among Indiana alumni.

When ESPN hired Bob Knight as a college basketball analyst, some questioned whether the coach with the legendary temper would be able to work as a TV commentator without dropping any four-letter words.

Bob Knight the basketball coach was never afraid to express opinions that might make people upset, whether talking to his players or his bosses or the referees, and Bob Knight the ESPN commentator hasn't lost that trait.

That's never been more apparent than it was when he talked about Alex Rodriguez on ESPN Radio.

There was a hefty dose of speculation yesterday that Bob Knight had interest in the now vacant head coaching position at the University of Georgia.

And today, on ESPN radio, Knight spoke with Mike Tirico and Scott Van Pelt, presumably to dismiss those rumors; instead, Knight indicated exactly why they have legs. He later followed that up by mentioning his interest in returning to coaching during the Tennessee-Oklahoma women's game.

Bob Knight has been great since he moved from the bench to the booth -- "Knight Watch" aside. He looks happy to be calling games for the WWL and he does a good job of it, so there's little reason to think he might want to get back into coaching.

Unless you listen to the AJC's Furman Bisher, who wrote Saturday that Knight is interested in the recently opened Georgia head coaching position.

It was the final college game at the Spectrum. It was the place where Bob Knight won two national championships at Indiana. It was the place where Christian Laettner hit the shot to knock off Kentucky and move Duke into the 1992 Final Four. So fittingly, in this finale, Villanova knocked off PItt 67-57.

This was an absolutely vital win for the Wildcats. They were on the verge of falling below .500 in the Big East. They lacked any high quality wins, and were barely staying in the Top 25. They got the big win by beating the third-ranked Panthers with the Wildcats' quickness able to get Pitt's inside players -- DeJuan Blair and Tyrell Biggs -- in foul trouble. It created the room for the guards to drive, dish and shoot.

When Iowa hired Steve Alford in 1999, he was one of the most sought after coaching commodities in the country, after what he built in Southwest Missouri State. The luster of his name -- what with the all-American accolades, national championship, and gold medal -- in the Big Ten surely didn't hurt matters with the Iowa basketball contingent. Excitement around the program led people to think they'd be a player in the Big Ten for the foreseeable future.

Eight years, a losing conference record, and a solitary NCAA tournament victory later, Alford fled the scene.

To hear it from him, though, he didn't move to escape a firing, nor was he pushed out by the athletic department. He left Iowa because he was presented with a better coaching opportunity. You know, leading the New Mexico Lobos.

"I just felt like at that time in my life, New Mexico was a better move," Alford said Saturday after a 67-55 loss to Virginia Commonwealth. "I still feel that way."

Really? It wouldn't have anything to do with the fact that the State of Iowa was teeming with people ready to pack his bags and drive him all the way down to New Mexico themselves?

You may not know what he looks like, who he was and why people felt he was special enough to teach them but Pete Newell was one of the best coaches college basketball has ever seen.

Newell died yesterday at the age on 93.

Newell was a legend and held the respect and admiration of the game's other legends. Newell coached for 14 years at San Francisco, Michigan State and California. He compiled a 234-123 record and won the 1959 NCAA Tournament while at Cal. His final head coaching gig came the very next year when he took an Olympic team with Oscar Roberston, Jerry West and Jerry Lucas to a gold medal.

He also beat UCLA's John Wooden the last eight times they met.

He's legacy lives on with his "Pete Newell Big Man Camp". The camp has been going on for over 30 years and has taught the likes of Lew Alcinder, Bill Walton, Shaquille O'Neal, Hakeem Olajuwon and Ralph Sampson. The camps have become a mandatory stop for any big man wanting to get into the NBA.