NCAA Tournament Best Coaches

This article takes a look at some of the best coaches in the NCAA tournament. How could we start anywhere else but with Duke’s Mike Krzyzewski. With 68 career NCAA tournament victories, Coach K is the winningest coach in NCAA tournament history. Not too shabby for a guy which still has a lot of years left in him. It comes as no surprise really with Krzyzewski coming from the Bob Knight school of coaching, having played under night at Army and having coached along side him at Indiana. Coach K picked up a bunch of NCAA tourney wins from 1988-1992 when he led the Blue Devils to five consecutive Final Fours, winning back-to-back titles in 1991 and 1992. As the coach of the NBA Olympic team, we really can’t regard any coach higher than Krzyzewski and he has another Duke team capable of making a Final Four run this season.

Roy Williams comes from the Dean Smith school of coaching and his Tar Heels squad is knocking on the door of another title this season. It is only fitting that the two top coaches on our list come out of the biggest rivalry in college basketball. Williams was the second winningest coach all-time at Kansas when he left and now he is looking to continue the North Carolina legacy. It didn’t take him long to earn his first NCAA Championship after he arrived in Chapel Hill. He replaced Matt Dougherty in 2003 and had the Tar Heels cutting down the nets in 2005. Williams is tied for sixth all-time in NCAA Tournament wins with 42 and has an NCAA postseason win percentage of .724, fourth-best among active coaches. Seven of his teams have been seeded No. 1 in a region in NCAA play. Williams has won at least one game in the NCAA tournament for 18 consecutive years (all-time record).

Tom Izzo’s Michigan State Spartans have reached the Final Four in four of the last nine seasons which is more than any other team during that span. Izzo’s .727 winning percentage (23-9 record) in the NCAA tournament ranks third among all active coaches with 10 or more games coached. And perhaps the most solid statistic of all that he could throw toward player in recruiting is that every MSU basketball player who has stayed four years under Coach Izzo has played in the Final Four of the NCAA tournament.

John Calipari needs a title to move up on this list, and he just might get it this year with his number one ranked and undefeated Memphis Tigers. Calipari has a record in the NCAA tournament of 18-9. He has reached the Final Four once and the Elite Eight four times. He is one of only three coaches in NCAA Division I history to direct two different schools to a number one seed in the NCAA tournament, Roy Williams and Bill Self are the others.

That last line allows us to segue to Bill Self who has had great success with Illinois and Kansas, but also doesn’t have a national championship ring. Self is 16-9 in NCAA tourney play and has four Elite Eight appearances. This year’s Kansas squad is as stacked a team as he has had. If he can’t break through this season, it makes me wonder if he ever will.

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