For the only fifth time ever, and first since 2014, two of college basketball’s biggest coaching names — John Calipari and Rick Pitino — will go head-to-head in the NCAA Tournament. A pair of coaching legends who have combined for 13 Final Fours and three national championships. And one of them won’t be making it out of the first weekend.
“I don’t go against coaches, we go against teams,” Pitino said after his St. John’s team pulled away from Omaha 83-53 to set up Saturday’s matchup with Calipari and Arkansas. “He doesn’t have to worry about me. My jump shot is long gone. We’re preparing for his players. He’s preparing for our players. John and I don’t play one-on-one anymore.”
Overall, Calipari leads Pitino 13-9 in their college matchups, though Pitino won the last match, a 2016 meeting when Pitino was at Louisville and Calipari was at in-state rival Kentucky. The two also met six times in the NBA, splitting those contests.
They’ve met four times before in the NCAA Tournament, with Pitino and Kentucky topping Calipari and UMass in the 1992 Sweet 16 and the 1996 Final Four, and Calipari and Kentucky besting Pitino’s Louisville squad in the 2012 Final Four and the 2014 Sweet 16.
“I have always had great respect for John,” Pitino said. “We have not seen this size and athleticism all year. We know what we’re up against, obviously.”
There are six active national championship-winning coaches in men’s college basketball and all of them got their current teams into this year’s NCAA Tournament.
While Baylor’s Scott Drew and Michigan State’s Tom Izzo don’t have another coach with a title ring in their path until potentially in the Final Four, the four competing in the West region will have to go through some collection of each other to get to San Antonio.
A Calipari vs. Bill Self matchup in Round 1, won 79-72 by the Razorbacks, opened the door for this latest Calipari-Pitino showdown.
Last night’s Red Storm 83-53 blitzing of Omaha — the most decisive NCAA Tournament win in program history — officially made it a reality.
Dan Hurley and Connecticut open tournament play Friday against Oklahoma and could meet Calipari’s Hogs or Pitino’s Johnnies in the regional final, if they get there.
That the latest showdown between the two intrinsically-linked big whistles is taking place in Providence, R.I., is, in many ways, apropos.
Calipari’s first head job came at UMass, 90 miles northwest of Providence. Pitino’s ties run even deeper. His first full-time head coaching job came at Boston University, 50 miles northeast of Providence, and his second came in that town with the Friars, whom Pitino led to the 1987 Final Four.
Of course, there was an even more fitting site on the table.
Before Thursday’s game, Calipari joked he was surprised the NCAA committee didn’t send Arkansas and St. John’s to Lexington, to set up the matchup of former Wildcat coaches at Rupp Arena.
“Come on. And they didn’t?” Calipari said. “When I saw we weren’t there, I’m like, ‘Wow. Somebody must have been sick and went to the bathroom or something for them not the put us there.’”
Going into Thursday’s meeting with Calipari, Self acknowledged that a Kansas win would actually dampen the outside buzz for the second-round game.
“There will be a little story line with Kansas and Arkansas,” Self said. “But the potential of a Calipari-Pitino second-round game may put Kansas in a favorable light, to be honest with you. We’ve been talked about enough over the years and over time. I’m kind of looking forward to having people talk about others and maybe we can kind of sneak up on somebody.”
Instead, everyone will be talking about Calipari vs. Pitino.
