Bob Knight: Thrown Chairs and Legendary Temper

On February twenty third, nineteen eighteen five, became an historic moment in coaching history. This was a day that Bob Knight, coach of the Indiana Hoosiers basketball team, through a chair across the court. Here's the story behind this iconic event today on Daily Sports History. Welcome to Daily Sports History. I'm Ethan Reese, your guide to a rapid deep dive into sports history. Every day. We've all seen basketball coaches do some pretty crazy things to motivate their players, such as getting technicals and getting thrown out of the game in a wild rage very common for coaches, or even going to sit in the stands say I'm gonna just go watch just like you. There's also been cases where we're in two thousand and seven, Fran McCarthy took off his suit, jacket, tie, dress shirt all in frustration, leaving only his undershirt trying to motivate his players. Or even George Carral writing a check for the referee as Sheid Wallace was getting fined for another technical. These are all fun, but none of them keep up with the all time great coach outrage. All came from Bob Knight, legendary coach of the Indiana Hoosiers. Now, Bob Knight was no stranger to basketball. He actually won a championship when he was a player at Ohio State, and after graduating Ohio State, he went on to start coaching and went to Army, which helped him get the nickname General as he was known throughout his life, and that was how he coached. He was very much a drill sergeant type of coach and expected perfection on every play. But to truly understand what led to this legendary outburst, we need to go back a little bit to previous years. Bob Knight had already won two n Cuba Championships up to this point, in seventy six, being the last team to go undefeated and in eighty one. Shortly after in the eighty one season, they had to rebuild, losing many of their seniors to graduation in pros and in this rebuilding they did struggle mightily, especially in the nineteen eighty four season, but they did have a bright hope in a young guard named Steve Alford started to take the world by storm and led them into the n Cuba Tournament for the chance and kept leading them win after win all the way to the Elite Eight and even beating Michael Jordan in the North Carolina tar Heels that year, but after losing an Elite Eight, Coach Night that summer went on to coach the US Olympic team, leading them to a gold medal, but leaving his off season very busy, eliminating the time with his family. But that year, coming up in the preseason polls, they were ranked fifth in the nation and other poles had them as high as three, and the US just started well with the thirteen and three record. Then it all started to fall down when they started to enter Big Tin play, and with this year being very busy, it also led to failings in Knight's personal life, as he and his first wife were now going through a separation, and that's when the losses started to mount. And then came that Faithful day when they were playing their rival Pretty University on their home court on February twenty third. The team was starting to unravel, especially their coach. At that point, they had lost six of their last nine games, and it seemed like Coach Knight had a play. One of the assistant coaches realized that Night showed up for that game not in his usual sports coat but instead had just on a polo. This led the coach to think maybe he was going to try to get himself thrown out, so he maybe go play around a golf after. It was all joking fun, but then it turns out later in the game, Knight complained about a foul against Alford, and then fifty eight seconds later he erupted at the officials for another foul. Now, on the ensuing inbound play, there was another foul called questionably and Knight was audibly cursing and handed a technical foul. At this point, Knight was boiling over and some of his players even said that it looked like he was going to try to take off his jacket and then realized he didn't have one, and then reached down for the next closest thing, which was the chair, and Night through the chair across the court, past the three throw line, stopping near the band and student section. No one knew what to do, but of course Knight was tossed from the game, and sadly this is not raise the morale of the team, as they lost their game to their rivals seventy two to sixty three. After all this, after throwing a chair making a spectacle. Night was only suspended one game by the Big Ten, not by AU. They would go on to be nineteen and fourteen that year, but just two years later they would win another national championship. When asked why he threw a chair, Bob Knight followed up by saying, well, he saw old lady walking around looking for somewhere to sit, and he thought she could have his chair. If you watched the video, there is no old lady, but it is a comical view on what he may have been thinking or lack thereof. Night was known for winning, as he won three championships and over his career had over nine hundred wins with over his seventy percent winning percentage while coaching at IU and including coaching several future NBA stars such as Isaiah Thomas and even briefly coached Larry Bird. But he was demanding, which led to his firing in two thousand and one from IU, as there is video of him grabbing players during practice in a violent manner. He was let go later hired by Texas Tech to finish out his career. He still loved by everyone in IU, and sadly he passed away in twenty twenty three, but he will always re remembered for throwing his chair across the court. Thank you for listening to today's Daily Sportistory. If you like this, call or text your friends and say hey, let's listen to the show together and come back tomorrow for more Daily Sportistry.