Remembering University of Dayton Basketball Coach Don Donoher

Don Donoher, who posted a 437-275 record in 25 seasons as the University of Dayton's men's basketball coach and is the school's all-time wins leader, passed away on April 12 at the age of 92. Donoher led the Flyers to postseason play in each of his first seven seasons and 15 times overall. He earned induction into the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame, the University of Dayton Athletic Hall of Fame, the Ohio Basketball Hall of Fame, the Toledo Area High School Hall of Fame and the Toledo Central Catholic High School Hall of Fame. Donoher was a three year letter winner as a UD player under Coach Tom Blackburn, who he later succeeded after Blackburn died of lung cancer in 1964.

In 1967, Donoher guided the Flyers to the NCAA Championship Game, where they lost 79-64 to a UCLA squad led by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, who was then known as Lew Alcindor. The Bruins had won the 1964 and 1965 NCAA titles under Coach John Wooden, who eventually captured a record 10 NCAA championships. Donoher is the first coach to lead his alma mater to the NCAA Championship Game after playing in the NCAA Tournament for his alma mater.

Donoher's Flyers followed up their NCAA runner-up finish by capturing the 1968 NIT title at a time when the NIT was much more prestigious than it is now. Dayton beat Kansas 61-48 in the 1968 NIT Championship Game. That Kansas squad was led by future Hall of Famer Jo Jo White, who later won two NBA titles (1974, 1976) with the Boston Celtics. UD's star player in the late 1960s was Don May, a two-time All-America selection who won the 1968 NIT MVP award. May was a member of New York's 1970 NBA championship team.

The Flyers made postseason appearances from 1969-71 before logging a pair of 13-13 seasons. In 1974, the Flyers finished 20th in the final AP poll after losing 111-100 in triple overtime to Bill Walton's UCLA squad in the NCAA Tournament. 

It would be 10 years before Dayton returned to the NCAA Tournament, but the Flyers participated in the NIT four times in a five year span from 1977-1982. Future two-time NBA All-Star Jim Paxson--whose brother John won three NBA titles with the Chicago Bulls in the 1990s--played for the Flyers from 1976-79.

I remember following the exploits of those late 1970s and early 1980s Flyers teams as a young boy, watching them on TV and sometimes going to games with my Dad. I still vividly recall several of those players, including big center Mike Kanieski, lanky forward Richard Montague, and scrappy point guard Kevin Conrad. 

Roosevelt Chapman, my all-time favorite college basketball player, joined the squad in 1980, and became UD's all-time leading scorer (a record that he still holds). He led the 1984 NCAA Tournament in scoring with 105 points in four games for a 26.3 ppg scoring average, highlighted by a 41 point outburst as he outdueled Wayman Tisdale--who became the second overall pick in the 1985 NBA Draft--in UD's 89-85 win over #2 ranked Oklahoma 89-85. Chapman and the 1984 Flyers authored one of the best Cinderella runs in NCAA Tournament history.

Donoher was highly respected within the coaching ranks. Bobby Knight tapped Donoher to be an assistant coach for the Team USA squad that won the 1984 Olympic gold medal. The Flyers qualified for the 1985 NCAA Tournament and then played in the 1986 NIT before enduring three straight losing seasons. In 1989, UD fired Donoher and replaced him with Jim O'Brien, who led the Flyers to the 1990 NCAA Tournament with players recruited by Donoher before going 39-77 in the next four seasons. O'Brien later spent nearly two decades as an assistant coach and head coach in the NBA. I interviewed O'Brien about the connections between basketball and chess.

Bobby Knight was outraged after UD fired Donoher, declaring to Ritter Collett (a Dayton sports columnist), "When I was named coach of the U.S. Olympic team, nobody could have wanted to represent the United States better than I did. So why did I pick Donoher to help me? Because I couldn't get a better coach. I may not know a lot of things, but I think I know basketball and I know I know more basketball than (Tom) Frericks and Brother (Raymond L.) Fitz. Donoher has maintained a very good Division I basketball program during a period when his salary was probably $25,000 under the average Big Ten coaching salary. Over the years, I've had a lot of people call me and ask me if I thought Don would be interested in another coaching job. When I called him to ask if he was interested, he invariably said, 'No, I don't even want to talk to them.' He was content to stay in Dayton. He has had a love affair with the school and the community. I think that is what burns me the most. Here is a man who had chances to leave, and I'm talking about some major jobs that have come open. He has never gone in to Frericks and said, 'Look, I've got this opportunity and it will pay me such-and-such.' He's never tried to use that to improve his earning power."

Donoher helped sign the players who led the Dayton Wings to World Basketball League titles in 1991 and 1992, and he also later worked as a scout for the Cleveland Cavaliers when Jim Paxson was the team's General Manager. Donoher spent some time as a high school coach in Ohio, and he was as serious about game plan preparation for those contests as he was when he coached players in the NCAA Tournament and the Olympics, telling writer Tom Archdeacon that those high school games were every bit as important to those players as the prime time games were to the more famous players.

I never met Donoher, but I have wonderful memories of interacting with several of his players. Chapman and Montague were two of my counselors at summer basketball camps in the early 1980s. Chapman taught me how to properly shoot a layup. He was a flamboyant player who specialized in fancy dunks and smooth finger rolls, but in person he was not flashy. As campers in awe of his jumping ability, we were always asking him to do a dunking exhibition for us, but he politely declined. I remember being excited when Chapman was selected by the Kansas City Kings in the third round of the 1984 NBA Draft, but I also remember that he did not seem thrilled when he showed up at our basketball camp after the NBA Draft; he understood that--as a 6-4 tweener--he was not likely to make the team, and indeed he ended up playing in the CBA before enjoying a successful pro career overseas.

I played in many pickup games with and against Dan Obrovac, who won the opening tip against Abdul-Jabbar in the 1967 NCAA Championship Game. Obrovac's hands were incredibly strong; he could hold a basketball in front of his body in those two big meathooks, and grown men could not punch the ball out of his grip. I would see him sometimes in the weight room, and he would easily do the full stack of weights on any resistance training machine that he used. Obrovac's knees were shot by the time that I played with him, but you could tell that he just enjoyed being on the court and playing in any capacity. 

I have a personal connection with UD as well, because in 2016 I became a UD alum after graduating from UD's two year law school program. Don Donoher and UD Flyers basketball were a big part of my childhood, and I will always remember him, those teams and those players fondly.

Bobby Knight Did it His Way

Bobby Knight, who passed away yesterday at the age of 83, coached the Indiana Hoosiers to three NCAA basketball championships (1976, 1981, 1987) en route to setting the all-time record with 902 career wins. Knight held that mark for four years (2007-11), and he now ranks sixth on the career wins list behind only Mike Krzyzewski, Jim Boeheim, Bob Huggins, Jim Calhoun, and Roy Williams. Although Knight will be remembered most for his time as Indiana's coach, he also won an NCAA title as a role player for Ohio State's 1960 team led by future Hall of Fame players Jerry Lucas and John Havlicek. Knight coached at West Point after finishing his college playing career and before coaching Indiana.

Knight's 1976 Indiana team went 32-0 and is the last NCAA team to post a perfect record en route to winning the championship. The 1975 Hoosiers went 31-0 before losing to Kentucky in the Elite Eight as Indiana's star Scott May scored just two points while playing with a broken arm after scoring 25 points during Indiana's 98-74 regular season win versus Kentucky. Knight later insisted that his 1975 team was even better than the 1976 championship team. Knight won his second NCAA title with sophomore Isiah Thomas leading the way in 1981, and he won his third NCAA title in 1987 after Keith Smart hit a famous baseline shot versus Syracuse. John Wooden (10), Mike Krzyzewski (five), and Adolph Rupp (four) are the only coaches who won more NCAA titles than Knight, who is tied with Roy Williams and Jim Calhoun.

Knight was inducted in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 1991, even though he previously asked to not be considered after he was offended that he had not been elected in his first year of eligibility, calling that slight a "slap in the face." Knight is the only coach to win an NCAA title (1976, 1981, 1987), an NIT title (1979), an Olympic gold medal (1984), and a Pan-American Games gold medal (1979).

Knight won without cheating, and he emphasized the importance of academics. He reportedly said that the fun part of coaching is not cheating to get top recruits but beating the schools that cheated to get top recruits. The great success of Knight's teams is even more remarkable considering that just one of Knight's players became an NBA All-Star: Isiah Thomas. 

Wooden and Knight are fascinating character studies: Wooden's demeanor was much more gracious than Knight's, but the irascible Knight ran a clean program while Wooden's program will forever have the shadow of crooked booster Sam Gilbert hovering over it. Great men--or men who accomplish great things--also often have great flaws.

ESPN's multi-part, 20 hour documentary "Basketball: A Love Story" prominently featured Knight, including his success coaching Team USA to the 1984 Olympic gold medal. Knight was a master basketball tactician whose teams played stifling man to man defense and ran a precision offense featuring crisp ball movement. Knight and Dick Schaap co-wrote a 1998 article detailing Knight's ideas about how to reform college basketball; the basketball wisdom that Knight displayed 25 years ago is still relevant today, as he criticized the proliferation of unstructured summer leagues, the malign influence of the sneaker companies, and the overuse of the three point shot.

One of Knight's assistant coaches for the 1984 Olympics was Don Donoher, who coached at the University of Dayton from 1964-1989. Donoher led UD to the 1967 NCAA Championship game, the 1968 NIT title, and the 1984 NCAA Elite Eight. Knight was outraged after UD fired Donoher in 1989, declaring to Ritter Collett (a Dayton sports columnist), "When I was named coach of the U.S. Olympic team, nobody could have wanted to represent the United States better than I did. So why did I pick Donoher to help me? Because I couldn't get a better coach. I may not know a lot of things, but I think I know basketball and I know I know more basketball than (Tom) Frericks and Brother (Raymond L.) Fitz. Donoher has maintained a very good Division I basketball program during a period when his salary was probably $25,000 under the average Big Ten coaching salary. Over the years, I've had a lot of people call me and ask me if I thought Don would be interested in another coaching job. When I called him to ask if he was interested, he invariably said, 'No, I don't even want to talk to them.' He was content to stay in Dayton. He has had a love affair with the school and the community. I think that is what burns me the most. Here is a man who had chances to leave, and I'm talking about some major jobs that have come open. He has never gone in to Frericks and said, 'Look, I've got this opportunity and it will pay me such-and-such.' He's never tried to use that to improve his earning power."

In 2007, Knight spoke at the "Celebration of Flyer Basketball" and said, "There's nobody that I've enjoyed more as a friend, respected more as a coach and thought did a better job in coaching in the circumstances that developed throughout his tenure at the University of Dayton."

In 2013, I reviewed Knight's book The Power of Negative Thinking:

Knight explains that there is "a large helping of my version of humor in the title chosen for this book" and adds, "I am not arguing for being a strict negativist, for walking around with a sour look, for always seeing the dark side, always expecting failure. That's not my intent at all. Quite the opposite."

Knight's thesis is that instead of blindly believing/hoping that an endeavor is going to be successful, "being alert to the possible negatives in any situation is the best way to bring about positive results." Knight believes "Planning beats repairing" because "There are so many unintended consequences in any important action that we need to at least consider, like the best chess player, how our next move could produce an unexpected chain reaction down the line."

Knight observes, "most basketball games are not won, they are lost," so therefore Knight constantly reminded his players, "Victory favors the team making the fewest mistakes." Considering his confrontational reputation, it is not surprising that Knight also put a twist on a famous advertising slogan when he declared to his teams, "This ain't Burger King. We'll do it my way."

"Negative thinking" in Knight's parlance is analogous to what the great chess player/theoretician/writer Aron Nimzovich called "prophylaxis," which in chess means overprotecting a strategically important square, thus ensuring the overall safety of the position and also providing for smooth, harmonious deployment of one's forces.

Of course, there was another, much less savory side to Knight: he was a bully whose inability to control his temper cost him his job at Indiana. Knight infamously threw a chair onto the court during a game, choked one of his players, and committed battery versus a variety of people, including a Puerto Rican police officer. The final act of Knight's legendary coaching career happened at Texas Tech, where he landed in 2001 after being fired by Indiana in 2000. After Knight set the NCAA record for career wins, he retired in midseason, thus practically forcing Texas Tech to hire his son Pat as head coach. Texas Tech went 4-7 down the stretch of the 2007-08 season, and Pat Knight lasted lasted just three more seasons before being fired after posting a 50-61 record. During a televised interview, Knight lashed out at Dick Schaap's son Jeremy--declaring that Jeremy had a long way to go to be as good as his father--and Dick Schaap rightly fired back at Knight that Knight would have been "outraged if someone had used him similarly to criticize his son Patrick, his assistant coach."

Knight had no filter. Dan Patrick asked Knight what he thought about the Indiana University officials who fired him. Knight replied, "I hope they're all dead." Patrick then noted that some of them had in fact died, and Knight said, "Well, I hope the rest of them go." 

The paradox with Knight is that he taught his players to be disciplined yet he often lacked discipline in both his deeds and his words. "Complicated" may be the adjective most frequently used to describe his legacy, because there is no denying that he was a great coach who did not cheat and there is also no denying that he often treated people very shabbily. ESPN's Jay Bilas summarized his take on Knight: "He was OK with reasonable disagreement, as implausible as that seems to those who didn't know him. But when he believed he was right, even when he wasn't, there was no talking him out of it." Knight's intelligence combined with his stubbornness in a way that was both a great strength and a great weakness.

If you are familiar with some of Knight's most memorable quotes, then you know that there is only one way this obituary can end, namely with the last wishes he expressed in a 1994 speech: "When my time on Earth is gone and my activities here are past, I want they bury me upside down and my critics can kiss my ass."

The General Abandons His Troops in the Middle of the Battle

Bobby Knight is one of the greatest coaches of all-time. He is also a bully and a hypocrite, someone who has long preached self-discipline while refraining from practicing it himself. Knight solemnly said that he was not prolonging his coaching career just to set the all-time wins record but that is about as believable as Roger Clemens asserting that he does not care about the Baseball Hall of Fame. Knight's boorish behavior resulted in him being exiled from Indiana, the site of his greatest triumphs. Texas Tech took him in at a time when his career and reputation were at a low ebb, providing him the opportunity to set a record that he professed not to care about. Now, with that record safely in his rear view mirror, Knight has rewarded that loyalty by abandoning the team in mid-season, essentially forcing the school to give his son the chance to coach a talented squad and thus get the inside track toward succeeding Knight. The title of Pat Forde's article about this situation says it all:

Knight's final act a hypocritical one in a career full of them