2012 College Basketball Picks and Predictions: Top 5 Coaches: Perhaps more than in any other sport, a college basketball coach is the biggest determining factor of a program’s success. After all, the head coach is in charge of recruiting players, developing players, creating a philosophy on both ends of the court, and managing the games themselves. Sure, there are assistant coaches, but unlike football, basketball coaches don’t have offensive and defensive coordinators calling plays. The elite coaches in college basketball are literally the faces of their programs, and John Wooden is still synonymous with UCLA decades after leaving the sidelines . With the 2012-13 college basketball season just around the corner, here is a look at how the elite coaches in the game today stack up.
2012 College Basketball Power Rankings: Top 5 Coaches
1. Tom Izzo, Michigan State
While winning is the ultimate goal of any coach, there is something to be said for winning the right way, and that is exactly what Izzo has done at Michigan State. He has a 412-169 record with the Spartans, he won the national title in 2000, he has made six trips to the Final Four, and he has made the NCAA Tournament in each of the last 15 seasons. Izzo has piled up his impressive while having just one lottery pick in the NBA Draft since 2001. Plain and simple, he gets his players to play as a team, believe in his system and peak in March almost every single year. He isn’t afraid to play a brutal schedule, and nobody gets more out of his players than Izzo.
2. John Calipari, Kentucky Wildcats
His system has been criticized at times, but after winning the national title last season, there is no doubt that he can win on the biggest stages with a lineup filled with one-and-done freshmen. He is an incredible recruiter and he has a 102-14 record since arriving in Lexington, and in the last five years, his 173 victories are 19 more than any other coach in the country. Calipari has made four trips to the Final Four in the career, including two straight with the Wildcats. Granted, he did have to forfeit both his trips with Memphis because, and history says it is only a matter of time before he gets Kentucky put on probation and moves on. Still, Calipari wins a ton of games wherever he goes, and nobody coach has been winning more games than he has in recent years.
3. Mike Kryzewski, Duke Blue Devils
In terms of career numbers, Kryzewski is without question the king among active coaches. He has won four national titles, including the 2010 championship, and he has been to 11 Final Fours overall. Not to mention the fact that he is the winningest coach in men’s Division I history with a 927-291 career record. His 2010 title was prove that his time as an elite coach isn’t over, and he has averaged more than 30 wins a year for the last five years. Still, Kryzewski has made just one Final Four appearance in the last decade, dropping him down the ranks just a bit.
4. Bill Self, Kansas Jayhawks
With a 269-53 record since coming to Kansas, there is no doubt that Self bring in plenty of talent and win plenty of games. With eight straight Big 12 titles and five of the last seven Big 12 tournament titles, there is no doubt he can dominate his conference. In the last five years, he has also shown he can win in March. The Jayhawks have a 17-4 record in the NCAA Tournament in the last five years, winning the national title in 2008 and reaching the title game last year. Self has won the second-most games during the five-year stretch, and if this recent trend continues, he will be moving up this list in the coming seasons.
5. Roy Williams, North Carolina Tarheels
He has a career record of 675-169, including a 257-68 record since coming to Chapel Hill. More importantly, his teams have missed the NCAA Tournament just twice since he began coaching in 1988. Williams also has seven Final Four appearances in his career, and he led the Tarheels to national titles in 2005 and 2009. He is one of the top recruiters in the country, and there has been a revolving door of lottery picks in the Tarheels’ starting lineup in recent years. In fact, there has been so much talent at North Carolina that Williams is somewhat of a victim of his own success. Despite all his victories and a pair of championships, there is still a feeling that he has underachieved a bit with some of his loaded teams.
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