Mike Krzyzewski

Michael William Krzyzewski ( born February 13, 1947 in Chicago, Illinois) is an American basketball coach. Since 1981, he coached the Blue Devils of Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. Due to its complicated surname it is often simply called Coach K. Krzyzewskis ancestors originally came from Poland.

Until 1969 he studied at the Military Academy at West Point and played basketball under coach Bobby Knight. From 1976 to 1980 he was himself head coach at West Point. In 1981 he got the coaching offer from Duke and adopted. 1986 came the Blue Devils to the NCAA finals, but were subject to Louisville. Five years later they won the title against Kansas. The following year, 1992, succeeded in defending the title, something that last UCLA under John Wooden in 1973 succeeded. The star player of the Blue Devils, Christian Laettner, at the Olympic Games in Barcelona was the only college player on the team to Michael Jordan, Larry Bird and Magic Johnson.

Krzyzewski Duke won in 2001 with his third title. In the same year he was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame. With over 900 victories, he is one of the most successful college coaches of all time. Many of his players were successful in the NBA, including Grant Hill and Elton Brand. Multi- professional teams Krzyzewski tried to poach, most recently in 2004, the Los Angeles Lakers, who wanted him to succeed Phil Jackson. Krzyzewski refused and remained loyal to Duke. There he had a contract until 2011.

Since summer 2006, Krzyzewski also coached the U.S. National Team. At the World Cup in 2006 the national team reached the 3rd place under Krzyzewski. In the FIBA Americas Tournament in the summer of 2007, he won with his team the gold medal and remained throughout the tournament without defeat, bringing the United States to participate in the Olympic tournament in 2008 qualified in Beijing.

The U.S. won sovereign all matches of the tournament the 2008 Summer Olympics and won for the first time since Sydney 2000 again the Olympic basketball gold medal.

In 2010, Krzyzewski Duke to victory in the Final Four, where the Duke Blue Devils were able to prevail in the final against the Butler University and thus National College Basketball Champion 2010 were.

2011 Krzyzewski was selected by the magazine Sports Illustrated Sportsman of the Year.

2012 successfully managed the U.S. national team, Krzyzewski to defend the title at the Summer Olympics in 2012.