final479
Freshman
Posts: 49
Reg: 01-19-08
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08-22-22 12:32 AM - Post#344169
In response to SecS3
A really impactful coach, no doubt.
My brother (may he rest in peace) was a huge Rutgers fan and dragged me to the Providence Civic Center in '89 to watch Rutgers lose to Iowa (?) in the afternoon session. As we left we walked past the Princeton team in their warmups and wished them luck; I was struck by how small and slight that team was. Taking Georgetown to the buzzer with that team was truly a tactical masterpiece.
However, "greatest Ivy coach"? Not so sure. Look at the string of Penn coaches from 1956 to 1982 (including a good chunk of Pete's career).
Jack McCloskey - NBA head coach and as GM the architect of the Pistons championship teams
Dick Harter - Led Penn to the regional finals. Later NBA head coach and longtime NBA assistant
Chuck Daly - Multiple NCAA wins at Penn. Recruited and coached multiple NBA first rounders. NBA championship coach, coach of the first dream team.
Bob Weinhauer - Final four coach, of course. Later GM for two NBA teams.
And then, later Fran Dunphy, who achieved great success as a coach at Penn, later at Temple and is a Philly basketball icon. And of course, Coach Donahue, who took a Cornell team to the Sweet 16, something Coach Carril never did.
To Pete's credit, he stuck around and gifted his skills to his university and no doubt turned down many opportunities with a bigger spotlight.
More than anything, I think Coach Carril was a great marketer of the special underdog story. I guess I wonder if his career results were as good as that story. In terms of his tactics, these were not necessarily new, but he popularized them in an era where speed and athleticism were taking over the college game. Also to Pete's credit, there was never a whiff of scandal around his program that I'm aware of.
Regardless, fans of college basketball are lucky to have enjoyed watching and rooting for or against Pete and his teams. And for the record, though I'm a diehard Penn fan, I admit I rooted for his teams in every NCAA game and even in the 1990 thrashing they suffered against UNLV.
Rest in peace, Coach
Edited by final479 on 08-22-22 12:38 AM. Reason for edit: No reason given.
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