Duke Blue Devils Men's Basketball - Team History - Mike Krzyzewski Era

Mike Krzyzewski Era

Mike Krzyzewski has been at Duke since 1980. His many accomplishments include:

• 4 National Championships
• 11 Final Fours (most since 1984–85) as well as five in a row from 1988 to 1992
• 20 Sweet Sixteens (most since 1984–85) and nine straight from 1998–2006
• 27 NCAA tournament berths
• 79 NCAA tournament wins (most ever)
• 12 No. 1 seeds
• 25 conference titles (12 regular season, 13 tournament), 10 of last 13 ACC Tournament Titles
• 12 30-win seasons
• 27 20-win seasons
• Number 1 AP ranking in 16 of the past 27 seasons
• 9 Naismith College Player of the Year Awards
• 9 National Defensive Players of the Year Awards
• 26 AP All-Americans
• 14 consensus first team All-Americans
• 11 NBA top-10 picks: T-1st
• 23 NBA Draft first round picks
• 925 Career wins ( most wins by a coach in Mens' Division 1 basketball as of 2/25/2012)

Krzyzewski's teams made the Final Four in 1986, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1994, 1999, 2001, 2004 and 2010.

Duke upset the heavily favored UNLV Runnin' Rebels 79–77 in the Final Four in 1991, a rematch of the 1990 final in which Duke lost by an embarrassing 30 points. The team, led by Christian Laettner, Bobby Hurley, Grant Hill, and Thomas Hill went on to defeat Kansas 72–65 to win the university's first NCAA Championship. Ranked #1 all season and favored to repeat as national champions in 1992, Duke took part in a game "acclaimed by many the greatest college basketball game ever played," according to ESPN. In the Elite Eight, Duke met the Rick Pitino-led Kentucky Wildcats. It appeared Kentucky had sealed the win in overtime when guard Sean Woods hit a running shot off the glass in the lane to put Kentucky up by one with 2.1 seconds left on the clock. After a timeout, Duke's Grant Hill threw a full-court pass to Christian Laettner. Laettner took a dribble and nailed a turn-around jumper at the buzzer to send Duke into the Final Four with a 104–103 victory. To the Duke faithful, this play will forever be known as "The Shot." The shot was named the most memorable basketball shot of all-time (including the NBA, college, and high school) by the Best Damn Sports Show Period in 2007 and the fifth most unforgettable sports moment of all-time across all sports in 2006. Duke went on to defeat the Sixth-seeded Michigan 71–51 to claim its second NCAA Championship. Duke defeated Arizona 82–72 to win its third NCAA Championship in 2001, becoming one of a handful of teams in NCAA Tournament history to defeat all of their tournament opponents by double digits. Krzyzewski was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame later that year. On April 5, 2010 Duke Men's Basketball won their fourth NCAA Championship by defeating Butler 61–59.

Duke has been ranked as the #1 team in the nation 235 weeks in their history. That is as many as Michigan State, Syracuse, UConn, Louisville, Ohio State, NC State, Arkansas, Georgetown, Maryland, Florida, Marquette, Villanova, and California combined. These thirteen programs have been to 63 Final Fours (2 vacated) and 17 National Titles.

Portuguese soccer star Cristiano Ronaldo, among other athletes and celebraties, has often expressed his admiration for Duke's basketball program.

Former Duke stars such as Alaa Abdelnaby, Johnny Dawkins, Cherokee Parks, Bobby Hurley, Antonio Lang, Roshown McLeod, William Avery, Trajan Langdon, Grant Hill, Danny Ferry, Christian Laettner, Brian Davis, Elton Brand, Shane Battier, Carlos Boozer, Chris Duhon, Mike Dunleavy, Dahntay Jones, Daniel Ewing, J.J. Redick, Shelden Williams, Corey Maggette, Luol Deng, Josh McRoberts, Gerald Henderson, Austin Rivers, Lance Thomas, Kyle Singler, Miles Plumlee, Nolan Smith, Jason Williams, and Kyrie Irving have gone on to play in the NBA. Many of Krzyzewski's assistants and former players, such as Tommy Amaker (Seton Hall, University of Michigan and Harvard), Bob Bender (Illinois State University and University of Washington), Mike Brey (Delaware and Notre Dame), Jeff Capel (VCU and Oklahoma), and Johnny Dawkins (Stanford) Quin Snyder (Missouri),have become head basketball coaches at major universities, while Pete Gaudet is now the head coach of the India women's national basketball team.