Jim Calhoun
Jim Calhoun
James A. Calhoun is the former head coach of the University of Connecticut men's basketball team. His teams won three NCAA national championships, played in four Final Fours, won the 1988 NIT title, and seven Big East tournament championships. With his team's 2011 NCAA title win, the 68-year-old Calhoun became the oldest coach to win a Division I men's basketball title. He won his 800th game in 2009 and finished his career with 873 victories, ranking 12th all-time as of...
along basketball bit career exactly five grow hopefully kids maintain miss obviously optimism six skin spit telling terrific wants watched weeks win
I've watched him grow as a person, but he's still been able to maintain his wit, his optimism and that ever-ready smile. A lot of kids would have spit the bit at different times if they weren't starting. All he wants to really do is play and win and that's exactly what he's done. He's as comfortable in his skin as any kid I've ever had. I'm telling you right now ? and hopefully it will be five weeks, six weeks before it's the end of his career ? I will miss him for his personality, along with obviously his basketball game. He's a terrific kid.
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When that game ended, I knew I had tied Don Haskins in career wins. That was a special moment for me that I didn't share with people, but it was nice to know I tied him.
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I don't care who we are playing. We have so much to gain. It's a wonderful opportunity for these kids. I would hate to leave the floor and not have given it our very best.
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It's an important game for them and for us it's an important game, too. You've got to make sure you take care of the home court and stay aggressive.
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What Louisville needed late in the game was experience. That's what we had, some guys coming down the stretch who know what to do. We turned our defense up in the last 4 1/2 minutes of the game, we took care of the ball, took good shots and made good decisions. This was a grind-it-out game.
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We're going to have to take care of the basketball; we're not doing that. We have to start blocking shots around the rim to change games. We're not doing that in this tournament. And then, just defense.
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Back in 1990, the (league) championship was a mad, mad celebration. It never affected that team because it was a magical year. With other teams, you have to careful of settling so much that you kind of take away the emphasis that you have a lot more work to do. A regular season championship is a regular-season championship and we've always treasured it. It's important to us. Is it the most important thing? No.
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Denham had arguably the best performance of his career at a great time.
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The national championship in 1999 took me back to my career at UConn. This has taken me back to my life, to where it began, my brother and four sisters and how meaningful they have been, to my family, my parents, my friends, my players, my assistant coaches. It's pretty deep.
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I think we showed up like a team that had glanced at our record and saw we had beaten Syracuse handily both times. My point is that in a tournament, no one really cares what seed you are or whether you beat someone before. It's the 40 minutes you're playing today that's important.
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We just shut the engine off. You can't go to sleep.
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We just shut the engine off. We just couldn't get it back. It's a hard thing to do in sports and I think all of us have seen it and unfortunately an experienced team like this, it shouldn't happen to.
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We weren't prepared. We were living on an 11-0 season that meant absolutely nothing because you have to play the next one.
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We were living on an 11-0 season that meant absolutely nothing. We took a 15-8 lead and from then, didn't play an ounce of basketball.