Duke icon Mike Krzyzewski already has the most wins of any college basketball coach in history. He’s the rock star of all rock star college coaches. He’s simply Coach K.
On the line for him this weekend is 1,000 career victories; a chance to become the first coach ever to reach this milestone. The Venue will be Madison Square Garden, The World’s Most Famous Arena. The opponent is St. John’s, led by Steve Lavin, another rock star coach.
The event of Coach K 1000 is all setting itself up to be a perfect, made for television event.
Fox Sports 1 will have the broadcast on Sunday, Jan. 25 (2:00 PM ET), as #5 Duke (16-2, 4-2 in the ACC, RPI 7) faces unranked St. John’s (11-5, 1-4 in Big East, RPI 40) at Madison Square Garden in New York City. Lavin hasn’t won anything big at St. John’s yet, but he is iconic to the sport due to the many years he’s spent as a big time broadcaster.
The Fox College Hoops Tip-Off pregame show begins at 1:30ET. Marquette head coach Steve Wojciechowski, a former player and assistant under Krzyzewski at Duke will be a guest. Sunday’s pregame also features a live presence at Madison Square Garden, plus, Duke icons like Bobby Hurley, Christian Laettner, Chris Collins and J.J. Redick have taped messages to their former mentor Coach K.
This week, Coach K sits down with FOX Sports college basketball analyst Bill Raftery for a special infomercial airing Friday, Jan. 23 (5:00 PM ET) on FOX Sports 1.
Gus Johnson and Jim Jackson will call the game with Molly McGrath on the sidelines, as Krzyzewski looks to make history in the same exact building where he broke Bob Knight’s career wins record in November 2011.
The spread hasn’t been released yet, but obviously the Johnnies will be huge underdogs.
There will also be a Coach K Cam, a special camera focused on Krzyzewski throughout the game. Coach K Cam is available free and unauthenticated to all users on FOX Sports GO.
On Twitter, get in the Coach K conversation by using the hashtag #Coach1K
In other words, this game has evolved into an event strategy, more than an non-conference college basketball game
Paul M. Banks owns, operates and writes The Sports Bank.net, which is partnered with Fox Sports Digital, eBay, Google News and CBS Interactive Inc.
You can read Banks’ feature stories in the Chicago Tribune RedEye newspaper and listen to him on KOZN 1620 The Zone. Follow him on Twitter (@paulmbanks)