Former UK coach Rick Pitino wants to make the most of whatever time he has left to coach. (UK Athletics Photo)
Rick Pitino became the first Division I men’s basketball head coach to take six different teams (Boston University, Providence, Kentucky, Louisville, Iona, St. John’s) to the NCAA Tournament.
At age 72, he’s already a Hall of Fame coach but the former Kentucky coach certainly was as motivated as ever this season with St. John’s, a No. 2 seed in the NCAA Tournament that was eliminated in the second round by Arkansas and former UK coach John Calipari
“I have been blessed for a long period of time. Fifty-plus years of coaching, and I think I look at it this way: I don’t know if God will bless me with two, three, four more years, but if he does, it’s going to stop. So why not have a blast? Why not get the most out of it? Laugh, have fun, get great experiences,” Pitino said before the Arkansas loss.
“Early years it wasn’t like that. You’re trying to accomplish certain things collectively with the team yourself. Now I don’t have to move up the ladder. I don’t have to look for another job. I don’t have any dreams of coaching elsewhere, so it’s just fun. You have fun with your guys. It’s laughter, it’s all the great things, but I do know it’s coming to an end.”
Pitino lets himself enjoy coaching more now than he did at his other collegiate and professional stops.
“I revel every single day in all of it,” Pitino said. “A long time ago when I started coaching, college basketball and college football were even. The NBA and NFL were even. Today, a bad Saturday football game, not even a top power four or five opponent, will outdraw an NBA playoff game. But this is our month. This is what college basketball lives for, March.”
Pitino left Kentucky for the Boston Celtics and then went to Louisville where off-court issues cost him his job.
“When I went away to Greece after being… any time you get fired, it’s always a traumatic experience, but even more so when I went through it, it was more traumatic,” Pitino said about reviving his career coaching a pro team in Greece after being fired at Louisville.
“Felt a little betrayed in a lot of areas, but I took off for Greece by myself. Never been to Greece, didn’t know the Euro league, didn’t know anything about it. I stopped hanging my head that night because I had to coach against CSKA, and then I had the most wonderful two years of a learning experience of my life at 65, and became the Greek National Coach.”
Pitino said he learned there was a “major silver lining” in the clouds for him and he learned valuable lessons in Greece.
“It rejuvenated me. It stopped me from being bitter at all. Just said, let’s get on with it. It’s just adversity. You can look adversity square in the eyes and piss all over it if you’re smart. So don’t hang your head, pick yourself up, get on, become the best Euro league coach you can possibly be and move on,” Pitino said. “Then I came back and tried to be the best coach (for Iona) in the MAC conference I could be. So it’s been fun. It’s been a blast.”
14 Responses
Say what you want but at least he didn’t try to extort more $ out of us before he left.
Who is us? You don’t pay any coaches salary at UK. Not one cent. Pitino did give you a middle finger on the way out of Rupp after Cal beat him for the Eighth time while he was at Loserville.
Us is Big Blue Nation. I guess you don’t know anything about it.
Nope. Not a member of the Big Boohoo Nation. Just a Ky Sports fan.
The biggest life lessons Pitino learned was not to get caught screwing your mistress inside your favorite restaurant and come up with better disguises for the hooker party on campus.
Screwing on a restaurant table and hooker parties sounds like fun to me.
That’s because you’ve never been screwed except by the last guy you voted for.
You need to quit worrying about Kentucky Basketball and go burn an electric car.
Get on your knees for your cult leader God!
And continue your support for terrorists and adding to the budget deficit.
Rick Pitino never coached at Boston College. He coached at Boston University. Check facts once in a while
My goodness. Love your neighbor as yourself? And who are we to judge his sin compared to our own. We all fall short of the mark. Should everyone be this judgmental of our neighbor? So I won’t judge your being judgmental.
As long as Pitino is not judgmental in his job….let the Lord alone work.
He’s the greatest college basketball coach of all time. If he would have stayed at Kentucky we would at least have 15 championships and that’s being very generous to other teams. He left when he was at the very top. If he would have stayed at Kentucky he would have been here for like 36-37 years? In 8 years we went to what 3 final 4s a elite 8 that should have been a final 4 that would have been 4 final 4s in 8 years alone and the first 2 years we were playing with basically walk ons in today’s basketball. Pitino is a hell of a coach and I still think he got screwed on the 2013 national championship. If he would have never left Kentucky he would have over 1,100 wins easily and Kentucky would be the greatest organization of all time. He was putting guys in the league like Calapari only difference is they would at least stay 2-3 years which I loved it. You had a couple of all stars on the team and great role players.
John Wooden is the greatest coach of all time! Pitino isn’t even close.