That's not usually the f-word people think gets tossed between the last two national title winners. He'd throw something at me. I'd throw something at him. Different things about our teams. Pitino and Calipari backed up their protestations with more than just words and were seen conversing in the bowels of the stadium while swapping spots on the interview dais. Maybe these guys don't really dislike one another -- pic. Thursday's routine wasn't anything we haven't heard before.
Both men shared similar sentiments before their matchup in the Final Four, when Calipari beat Pitino en route to winning a national title at Kentucky — something Pitino had done in Lexington 16 years earlier. Of course, because the two men wield so much power in college basketball and have seen their paths cross so many times, it stands to reason everything hasn't always been so chummy among Pitino, 61, and Calipari, six years his junior.
The printed record suggests just as much. As the story is often told, the two met when Calipari was a teenager at the Five Star camp. That origin story of Calipari's head coaching career, however, did not hold up well during a Calipari profile in Sports Illustrated that was written by S.
Price in Not only did Price quote a source that said Pitino backed another candidate for the UMass opening, but Pitino was initially reluctant to talk about Calipari for the article.
The Pitino-Calipari dynamic has had other famous moments since they first coached against each other in Kentucky's Sweet 16 win over UMass in — two days before the Duke and Christian Laettner game.
There was the time that Pitino felt Calipari had lobbied the officials before a Memphis-Louisville matchup in and got his way once the game began. Calipari later made waves when he took Pitino's old job at Kentucky and said that the Wildcats were a unique program in that they lacked the big instate rivalry of say a North Carolina Duke or Michigan Michigan State. Of course, none of this would be so intriguing if both men weren't so powerful or if their rivalry weren't so even.
Calipari took a slight edge in their collegiate matchups when Kentucky beat Louisville back in December. Both men have a Final Four victory over the other Calipari in , Pitino in and both won three professional games apiece when they were failing in the NBA with the Nets and Celtics.
Their 20th and latest matchup in the NCAA tournament should be one to remember as Pitino puts his pristine record in Sweet 16 games on the line with an experience-heavy team that's defending the national title.
Calipari will respond with a young squad that's rebounded from early disappointment to hint at fulfilling the promise of that preseason No. And that Rick sent a text message back, accepting that explanation, telling Cal not to worry about it.
And apparently the texting continued from there, Louisville playing and winning and Calipari texting Pitino to congratulate him. Kentucky playing and improving as the season went along and Rick texting Cal, saying he noticed. John Calipari won his first national title in ; Rick Pitino got his second last spring.
That's what people close to both coaches were telling me on Thursday, and if I were susceptible, malleable, easily manipulated, I might believe that Pitino and Calipari have grown since the days when, yes, it was pretty clear they didn't like each other. Pitino played at UMass and then Calipari coached there.
Pitino coached at Kentucky and now Calipari does. They have the same look. They are too close, too similar, too competitive to be anything but at each other's throats. And so they were, for years. I'd be stunned if he thinks of me in a week. Both of us have tough jobs that have to be engulfed in what we do. It sounds good, even believable, but Calipari can make anything sound good, believable. Nobody talks as good as Cal, and if that somebody exists, that somebody is Pitino.
And so I don't believe it. Not their words. Not their stories. I believe what my eyes see, and here's what my eyes saw Thursday after the talking was over and Calipari was walking through the mostly empty hallways of Lucas Oil Stadium and he encountered Pitino with almost nobody there to see what happened next:. The men stopping. Calipari putting his hand on Pitino's shoulder and leaning in to say something into Pitino's ear.
Pitino listening. Pitino smiling. There are a few reasons why this game has more going for it than Ohio State vs. Kansas including not being Ohio State vs. Kansas , but none more interesting than the in-state rivalry and the coaches who serve as the faces for that rivalry. Rick Pitino and John Calipari have been running parallel races for years and somewhere along the way they started hating each other. According to Pitino , the story begins when he first met and befriended Calipari as a camp counselor.
Pitino would later play a major role in bringing Calipari in as the head coach of UMass. Pitino was an alum and served on the committee responsible for choosing Calipari to lead the Minutemen.
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