Dan WetzelApr 4, 2025, 07:30 AM ET
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- Dan Wetzel is a senior creator concerned about investigative reporting, information research and have storytelling.
SAN ANTONIO — For over 3 a long time, Mike Krzyzewski lorded over the Ultimate 4.
He introduced his Duke program right here 13 occasions, profitable 5 nationwide titles and changing into totally interwoven with now not simply this system, however the college as nicely.
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Duke. Ok. It used to be one and the similar.
Then, in 2022, after 42 seasons, he retired and — no less than on the subject of Blue Devils basketball — all however disappeared.
Regardless of this system being run the previous 3 seasons by means of Jon Scheyer, a celebrity on Duke’s 2010 nationwide championship workforce who later spent 9 years as Trainer Ok’s assistant, and Krzyzewski keeping up now not only a place of dwelling in the community, however an workplace on campus, the now-78-year-old has been to observe only a few occasions and did not attend a unmarried sport till this season.
It has all been a part of Krzyzewski’s plan to step into the shadows and make allowance his outdated program to grow to be Scheyer’s program by means of heading off the soaring presence of a legend.
It’s also, many consider, a explanation why that Duke isn’t just again within the Ultimate 4, however the making a bet favourite to clip the nets Monday, underneath the 38-year-old Scheyer.
“Trainer Ok has given me wonderful room to be myself,” Scheyer stated Thursday. “I believe he understands, when he is round, simply the gravity and the folks having a look at him and all that. It is been, like, a good looking factor, very natural and herbal with Trainer Ok and I. The truth [is] we are nonetheless tight as might be. “
For Krzyzewski, this could not be simple.
He used to be famously in keep watch over of each and every aspect of his program over the years, calculating and seizing each and every closing merit. His lifestyles used to be basketball, particularly Duke basketball. Scheyer stated he continuously calls Krzyzewski for recommendation. Ok additionally once in a while speaks to the gamers when he runs into them across the basketball facility and has addressed the workforce every season.
The whole thing else, despite the fact that, is hands-off, a incontrovertible fact that calls for the self-discipline of a West Level grad executing a well-thought-out plan that Ok believed would maximum receive advantages Scheyer and subsequently maximum receive advantages Duke basketball.
“No longer many coaches actually need this system to be successful as soon as they are achieved,” Scheyer stated. “I believe a part of his legacy perpetually might be the truth that he set our program up for such good fortune, and we are ready to be in a Ultimate 4 in Yr 3. It is a credit score to him and the way the succession has long gone down.”
The problem of succeeding a a hit trainer has plagued systems and franchises for years. Keeping up greatness is at all times tough. Discovering successive elite coaches is, too. It may be in particular difficult when the substitute is a tender trainer in his first process, studying within the highlight of expectancies. Krzyzewski, for instance, received 10 and 11 video games, respectively, in his 2d and 3rd seasons. Few paid consideration.
Scheyer is 89-21 (.809) as a head trainer, proving himself each at the sidelines in addition to at the recruiting path — with freshman sensation Cooper Flagg, specifically. Scheyer hasn’t taken the remnants of a Krzyzewski workforce to the Ultimate 4; that is all his paintings. Only one participant, senior heart Stanley Borden, carries over from Krzyzewski’s ultimate workforce in 2021-22.
“I believe the general public need to be the fellow who follows the fellow who follows the fellow, proper?” Borden stated Thursday. “The primary man who adopted the fellow will take the entire blame when issues do not cross nicely.”
Krzyzewski stated on his Sirius XM radio display that he and his spouse, Mickie, might be attending Saturday’s semifinal towards Houston. He didn’t attend a sport right through Scheyer’s first two seasons however returned this season, together with sitting subsequent to actor and Duke alum Ken Jeong at a sport in Las Vegas. He hasn’t been to a NCAA match sport but, alternatively.
“I am making plans on being there to look at ’em,” Krzyzewski stated at the display. “I attempt to keep out of it publicly, simply to provide our program a possibility to stay transferring in its course. However I need to be there for Scheyer. … Glance, I need Duke to win. So I need to be there in fortify of them.”
That the inside track broke as a part of Krzyzewski’s personal radio program is an indication that he has infrequently bogged down. He is nonetheless extraordinarily visual in nationwide promoting campaigns and with talking engagements.
But on the subject of Duke Basketball, there is not any query who’s in rate.
Borden stated that there are similarities between the boys — Scheyer, in any case, nonetheless calls Krzyzewski, his “Trainer” — however that this system has totally transitioned.
“They are each fatal aggressive,” Borden stated. “I believe they simply have very other types. The personalities are very other. … I will be able to see the via line from one to the opposite. Trainer Scheyer simply spins it and says it and does it in his personal means.
“What I will be able to say from figuring out Trainer Scheyer, each when he used to be affiliate head trainer then head trainer, is that he’s a basketball savant. He simply sees the sport otherwise.”
That’s what has stood out throughout school basketball. Possibly it is the loss of Krzyzewski sitting two rows at the back of the bench, or possibly it is simply that Duke (35-3) performs the sort of good emblem of basketball that this workforce specifically stands by itself.
“I’m going to let you know how excellent Jon Scheyer has been: No one talks about him changing Trainer Ok anymore,” Houston trainer Kelvin Sampson stated. “I believe that speaks volumes for him.”
Scheyer stated he has liked that Krzyzewski has begun to really feel relaxed coming to a few video games and hopes Ok is in attendance Saturday.
“I need him to be proud when he watches us,” Scheyer stated.
Possibly Krzyzewski now not being worried about overshadowing his protégé serves as without equal signal that the challenge has been achieved and the baton in Durham has totally been handed.
