How did Coach K sustain success at Duke for 42 years?

Dan Wetzel and SI's Pat Forde Dan Wetzel and SI's Pat Forde look back at the legendary career of Duke basketball coach Mike Krzyzewski ahead of his final battle at home against North Carolina on Saturday. What was the key to Coach K's success?

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[CHEERING]

DAN WETZEL: Coach K, you might have heard. He's retiring at the end of the season.

PAT FORDE: They've kept it really quiet.

DAN WETZEL: 42 years, and he just won the ACC.

PAT FORDE: Yeah.

DAN WETZEL: So the reason that you can do that is because he switched things up. And you look at the-- and it really went somewhat around when he got the Olympic job in '08, in '06, when he took over the Olympic job. And then on from there, and he learned to be far more interested in-- he embraced the one and done. He embraced his inner Nike.

PAT FORDE: Yep.

DAN WETZEL: He embraced everything that would go along with it. And you look at his players, there's a period-- I think the singular moment that everything changed for him, you could go whatever you want. You could say that '08 Olympics. In the fall of '09, he got Kyrie Irving to commit.

PAT FORDE: Right

DAN WETZEL: Classic one and done. Not-- you go you go pre-'08 and his great players were four-- the whole game was like this. But it was late Laettner, Early, Battier. That, to me, was one of his best things.

And again, this is why Krzyzewski is the general. It's like, this tactic isn't quite working right now. Well, hell, come on down Kyrie. You're a little nuts, but we'll deal with you. You know? We'll figure it out.

You can play. Let's go. And he figured out how to coach those teams.

PAT FORDE: Yeah, no. He did. And I mean, there were a couple of different inflection points where I think you can go back and see where he changed tactics, for sure. By the way, '06 was the last time they won the outright ACC title. That was a really good team.

In the late '90s is when OK, he's coming back. They win the title, '91-'92. They are by far the best program in America from '86 through '92. Really through '94, they make a championship game there with Grant Hill. And then Krzyzewski has the back issue, sits out the season. Mentally, he's shot.

Comes back, gets the program back going, but it hasn't really elevated fully. And so hey, we better go get some guys, including Corey Mcgeady and Chris Duhon, and OK. So there were some stuff with those guys. Right? I mean, Corey Mcgeady's recruitment. You know about very well.

You wrote about it. I wrote about it.

DAN WETZEL: You know.

PAT FORDE: Yeah.

DAN WETZEL: He had Quinn Snyder as his assistant, too.

PAT FORDE: Quinn Snyder.

DAN WETZEL: Quinn was trying to update the offense, like everything. Quinn was trying to update everything.

PAT FORDE: Yeah, yeah.

DAN WETZEL: Quinn's turned out to be an incredible coach of his own, once he got to the NBA.

PAT FORDE: NBA, he's found where he should be.

DAN WETZEL: Phenomenal coach, yeah.

PAT FORDE: Yeah, but you know Chris Duhon's mom moved from Slidell, Louisiana to Durham, that was the first one of those like hmm, maybe Duke's doing things that everybody else is doing, too. A little bit of an eye opener there.

And then, yeah, the next big evolution. And again, after you win the title in '01, but then it's not-- you're not quite getting there. Well, let's try at something different. And then all of a sudden, now you're embracing one and done, and you're bringing those guys in. You win the 2015 title, very much driven by one and done guys, Jahlil Okafor and Justise Winslow on that team, and you play zone defense. I mean, they did a lot of stuff different. And now, again, he does have a chance to go out on top, which would make for an incredible storyline this tournament.