Duke Blue Devils head coach Mike Krzyzewski shocked the college basketball world back in June when he announced he would be retiring at the end of the 2021-2022 season, ending a 42-year reign as the head coach at the program.
The school wasted no time in announcing Coach K’s successor, naming assistant coach and former Duke player Jon Scheyer as his replacement for 2022.
Saturday will be the final home game of Krzyzewski’s career, coming against bitter rival North Carolina. It’s expected to be a bittersweet moment for both Krzyzewski and Scheyer.
“There’s a lot of emotion at play. The fact that it’s 42 years. I’ve played for coach. I’ve been coaching alongside him now for five years. It’s hard to believe it’s his last time. I don’t quite know how I’ll take it all in,” Scheyer said Friday morning on ESPN’s Get Up.
“I think the fun part and maybe the daunting part is there’s not really a game plan to do this, right?” said Scheyer. “It’s not like you can look at some other coaching transition of succession where a guy’s been there for 42 years, five national championships, and ‘this is how he was followed.’ But I think it’s exciting because you can make it your own.”
.@DukeMBB associate head coach Jon Scheyer spoke on following in Coach K's footsteps ⬇️ pic.twitter.com/llVQDRCOhZ
— Get Up (@GetUpESPN) March 4, 2022
Scheyer will get to remake the program in his image, for better or worse. While Duke has been synonymous with Coach K for decades, the Hall-of-Famer said on Thursday that once he retires he will have no role in the program, so it will entirely be up to Scheyer to lead them into the future.
Duke certainly still has a lot of unfinished business this year to worry about, with the upcoming ACC and NCAA tournaments, but it sounds like Scheyer is eager and ready to become the head coach at Duke next season.
