GREENVILLE, S.C. — Mike Krzyzewski could not remember on Saturday the first time he coached against Tom Izzo — or if Krzyzewski did recall, he said he didn’t. A little more than 23 years had passed since the start of one of college basketball’s enduring coaching rivalries, one that quickly developed into a lasting friendship.
“I don’t remember a lot of things,” Krzyzewski said, and he maintained that Duke’s 73-67 victory against Michigan State on Dec. 2, 1998, was among those moments that had faded from memory. Back then, Krzyzewski was near the peak of Duke’s late-1990s resurgence and Izzo was in his fourth season at Michigan State. They’d meet again later that same season in the Final Four.
Krzyzewski had established himself as one of the sport’s most accomplished coaches, with the consecutive national championships he’d won earlier in the decade. Izzo then was trying to build something. A story the Detroit Free Press published the day they first coached against each other led with a detail about one of Izzo’s “prized possessions:” a magazine profile of Krzyzewski in which Izzo found reason to believe he could one day follow a similar path.
