Bob Knight, the brilliant and combustible coach who won three NCAA titles at Indiana and for years was the scowling face of college basketball, has died. He was 83.
Knight’s family made the announcement on social media on Wednesday night. He was hospitalized with an illness in April and had been in poor health for several years. (NOTE: Audio below does contain some graphic language)
“It is with heavy hearts that we share that Coach Bob Knight passed away at his home in Bloomington surrounded by his family,” the statement said. “We are grateful for all the thoughts and prayers, and appreciate the continued respect for our privacy as Coach requested a private family gathering, which is being honored.”
Bobby Knight might have coached at Indiana, and later at Texas Tech, but his ties to Minnesota are significant, and that significance is tied to one man in particular: WCCO Radio's and the Star Tribune's late sports scribe, Sid Hartman.
Knight was one of Sid's famous "close, personal friends." It was a relationship built up over a half century, and a relationship built on loyalty. Sid would stop at nothing to defend Knight, even from the indefensible. As Sid's son Chad told Patrick Reusse of the Star Tribune, the line "You don't know all the great things he does for people" was how that defense argument usually started and stopped.
It went both ways.
"The best word that I think describes Sid is an old Gaelic word. Sid's a tinc, there is nobody comparable," said Knight at Sid's 50th Anniversary Gala in 2005. "That's what Sid is, there is nobody comparable. When I travel inevitably someone will come up to me and ask, 'are you a close, personal friend of Sid Hartman's?' I always answer I hope so, because there is nobody that I've met, in the now 40 years I've been in sports, that I respect more, admire more, like better, or would count on more than Sid Hartman."
Hartman, who died at the age of 100 in 2020, said he talked to Knight every week. When Knight left Texas Tech in 2008, Hartman broke the news on WCCO Radio's Sports Huddle because Knight had "promised me the scoop."
He wrote that week in the Star Tribune, "The basketball world will miss this guy who for those who know him love him and respect that he was not only a winner but contributed as much to the game as any coach ever."
Frequently, Knight would come to Minnesota on hunting trips and inevitably connect with Hartman. They frequented Sid's favorite restaurants like Murray's or Vescio's.
Knight quickly agreed to be at Sid's 50th Anniversary Gala to support his old friend, and in the way only the irascible Knight could do, gave many of the WCCO Radio staff a hard time when asked to go on a talk show with Mike Max, saying "I'll get over there when I'm good and ***damn ready!"
Of course he brought the house down with his sometimes blue and rough speech that mirrored his coaching style, giving his introducer that night, Harvey McKay, a hard time and even going after Governor Tim Pawlenty. But by the end of his 20-minute speech, he was moving the audience with his tribute to his old friend Sid, showing the fierce loyalty that made (most) former players adore their "coach". It was why you loved Knight, and ultimately brought him down.
Knight was among the winningest and most controversial coaches in the sport, finishing his career with 902 victories in 42 seasons at Army, Indiana and Texas Tech while mentoring some of America’s best coaches. He also coached the U.S. Olympic team to a gold medal in 1984.
The Hall of Famer cared little what others thought of him, choosing Frank Sinatra’s “My Way” to celebrate his 880th win in 2007, then the record for a Division I men’s coach.
He was nicknamed “The General” and his trademark temper also cost him his job at Indiana in 2000. He once hit a police officer in Puerto Rico, threw a chair across the court and was accused of wrapping his hands around a player’s neck.
Critics fumed relentlessly about his conduct, but his defenders were legion. There was this side of Knight as well: He took pride in his players’ high graduation rates, and during a rule-breaking era he never was accused of a major NCAA violation.
At Indiana, he insisted his base salary not exceed that of other professors. At Texas Tech, he sometimes gave back his salary because he didn’t think he earned it.
Knight expected players to exceed expectations on the court and in the classroom. He abided by NCAA rules even when he disagreed with them, never backed down from a dust-up and promised to take his old-school principles to the grave.
While he was beloved by many of his players, his disposition and theatrics sometimes overshadowed his formidable record, tactical genius, innovation and dedication to and the game, leaving behind a singular resume.
“He changed basketball in this state, the way you compete, the way you win,” Steve Alford, the leader of Knight’s last national championship team in 1987, once said. “It started in Indiana, but he really changed college basketball. You look at the motion offense and people everywhere used it.”
Robert Montgomery Knight was born Oct. 25, 1940, in Massillon, Ohio. His mother, whom Knight credited as his strongest childhood influence, was a schoolteacher and his father worked for the railroad.
Hazel Knight seemed to understand her son’s temperament. Once, when Indiana was set to play Kentucky on television, two of Knight’s high school classmates ran into her at a grocery store and asked if she was excited about the game, according to his biography, “Knight: My Story.”
“I just hope he behaves,” his mother remarked.
He played basketball at Ohio State, where he was a reserve on three Final Four teams (1960-62). He was on the 1960 title team that featured Jerry Lucas and John Havlicek, two future Basketball Hall of Famers.
After a year as a high school assistant, Knight joined the staff of Tates Locke at West Point. In 1965, he took over as head coach at age 24. In six seasons, coaching the likes of Krzyzewski and Mike Silliman, his teams won 102 games and it was off to Indiana in 1971.
Other big-time coaches might follow the gentlemanly, buttoned-up approach, but not Knight. He dressed in plaid sport coats and red sweaters, routinely berated referees and openly challenged decisions by NCAA and Big Ten leaders. His list of transgressions ran long:
— Knight was convicted in absentia of assaulting a Puerto Rican police officer during the 1979 Pan American Games.
— He forfeited an exhibition game to the Soviet Union in 1987 when he pulled his team off the court after being called for a third technical foul.
— He told NBC’s Connie Chung in a 1988 interview, “I think that if rape is inevitable, relax and enjoy it.” Knight was answering a question about how he handled stress and later tried to explain he was talking about something beyond one’s control, not the act of rape.
— He was accused of head-butting one player and kicking his own son, Pat, during a timeout.
— At a 1980 news conference he fired a blank from a starter’s pistol at a reporter. During the 1992 NCAA Tournament, Knight playfully used a bull whip on star player Calbert Cheaney, who is Black.
His most famous outburst came Feb. 23, 1985, when Purdue’s Steve Reid was about to attempt a free throw. A furious Knight picked up a red plastic chair and heaved it across the court, where it landed behind the basket. Fans started throwing pennies on the court, one hitting the wife of Purdue coach Gene Keady. Reid missed three of his next six ensuing free throws.
“There are times I walk into a meeting or a friend calls to say, ‘I saw you on TV last night,’” Reid said on the 20th anniversary of the incident. “I know what they’re talking about.”
Knight apologized the next day, received a one-game suspension and was put on probation for two years by the Big Ten. Intent on preventing such a thing again, Indiana officials chained together the chairs for both benches.
Knight's survivors include wife Karen and sons Tim and Pat.
The Associated Press contributed to this story.