Where in the world is Coach K?

Apparently, he's buying himself a convertible on his American Express.

Thanks Tim Keown. It's nice to know that someone else has noticed that Coach K was cropping up everywhere during the first two rounds of the tournament.

Of course lately there has been alot of conversation over the relative merits of coaches. I am obsessed with the way that Pat Summitt's win record that now places her ahead of the Great Dean Smith* has been treated in sports media in the last few days. The basic argument is that Pat Summitt has coached during a period when there were few decent women's teams and thus her wins are not equivalent to the wins of Dean Smith or Coach starts with a K has few vowels and only two of his players can spell it. Thanks to one of my favorite sportswriters King Kaufman of salon.com for giving a brilliant** response to that argument. Take that sexist sports world just deal, chicks rule!!!

One of things that bothers me is how the strength of a coach seems all too often to be judged only in terms of wins and losses. But, for me there's something else and no it's not that warm and fuzzy "does the coach make her/his players better people" 'scuse me but if you suck by the time you are twenty some geezer with a basketball and a whistle isn't going to turn it around even if you do stick around to become a super senior.

Here's my question...is it a sign that Coach K is a great coach or that he has a serious area of weakness in terms of developing players that some of his best players have been horribly disappointing professional players....did somebody say Bobby Hurley...that's not nice...Christian Laettner likes to be the first one mentioned in these conversations. Or maybe he's just such a great coach that he gets the very best out of players who lack the ability to self-motivate. I do not know the answer and these are certainly not the only choices. (And before you even ask, no Vengeance, I don't want to rochambeaux over it). However, I would prefer that sports writers facilitate these sorts of debates rather than disparaging women's basketball.

--And that's my TRUTH

*Apparently one is required to place the honorific "great" before the name of Dean Smith since it feels like every single article that mentions his name has done so.

**I can no longer use that word without thinking of the Guiness ad. I'm sure however that my father would like to dispute the following statement, "Not drinking six beer at the same time...brillant!" Of course, it would be a spirited debate especially AFTER he drank that sixth beer.