The wine-and-pizza evening when Jerry Colangelo talked Mike Krzyzewski into returning for a third Olympics is nearly as much a part of USA Basketball lore as the Dream Team. Having won two gold medals, Krzyzewski was finished, headed back to Duke and Duke alone, only for Colangelo to convince him to give it a third go.
Whatever happens in Rio de Janeiro, there will not be a fourth. There isn't enough wine or pizza for that. There's also an anointed successor to Krzyzewski, ready to take over and guide the team toward 2020 after the Olympics _ and even before them.
At the team's training camp in Las Vegas earlier this month, wherever Krzyzewski went, Greg Popovich wasn't far behind. That was entirely deliberate. The conveyance of leadership from the most honored active college coach to the most honored active NBA coach is a planned, orderly transition from one era to the next.
"There's the passing of the baton, the torch, the Olympic torch, so to speak," Krzyzewski said.
Just as Krzyzewski and Colangelo, the managing director of USA Basketball, laid out a long-term plan when Krzyzewski took the Olympic job in 2006, the transition of leadership has been carefully considered. Krzyzewski's goal when taking over was to establish continuity within USA Basketball, to indoctrinate young players, to establish a culture, to build a player pool that could withstand injuries and last-second withdrawals, to remove the lurching from Olympics to Olympics that had set in after the initial euphoria of the Dream Team, with disastrous results.
"When we first started in 2006, USA Basketball was fragmented," said Northwestern coach Chris Collins, a former assistant to Krzyzewski both at Duke and with Team USA. "It wasn't a program. We had the talent but there was no continuity, in terms of the coaches or in terms of the players that were playing, and we had struggled because of it."
