Duquesne’s Keith Dambrot said question was ‘fair,’ but he understands Coach K’s reaction
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Keith Dambrot said he feels empathy for Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski, who had testy words for a student reporter after a loss last week. But he added, “I thought it was a fair question.”
After Duke’s third loss in a row, 70-65 to Louisville on Saturday, reporter Jake Piazza of the Duke Chronicle student newspaper asked Krzyzewski about his team’s “next step forward.”
“I’m just curious as to what the next step forward here is for the team as you guys move into another week of basketball,” he said.
This was a weekend I will never forget. From going viral on Twitter to getting a phone call apology from Coach K, here is the recap of it all:https://t.co/uNcgqb9EWA
— Jake Piazza (@jake_piazza) January 25, 2021
Krzyzewski, 73, said, “Yeah, why don’t we just evaluate this game? I’m not into what our next step forward is right now.” Then, he compared the question to Piazza leaving a difficult class and immediately being asked about his “toughest test.”
Krzyzewski later reached out and apologized to Piazza, an economics major who drove nine hours with a co-worker to cover the game.
“Our call was short, but the sincerity in his apology was genuine,” Piazza wrote in his column. “And in the end, I appreciated the call.”
Dambrot said he understands how a losing coach might get upset while answering questions from reporters immediately after the game.
“He’s a good man,” he said of Krzyzewski. “Right after a game is a tough time for a coach, especially a competitive man who’s done it for as long as he’s done it. You don’t even want to do the interview at that point. Anything somebody says at that point you have to take with a grain of salt, really. It wasn’t personal.
“The older you get,” the 62-year-old Dambrot said, “trust me, I know, it’s even worse.
“I feel for both sides of the equation. Certainly, the young man didn’t deserve it. Coach K, he didn’t really mean it.
“Coaches are competitive. They don’t really like to get second-guessed or asked tough questions, especially after a loss. We don’t want to hear it.
“Nobody wants to hear their breath stinks. Sometimes, your breath stinks.”
Dambrot compared the situation to the day his mother, a psychology professor, questioned why he didn’t catch a ground ball while he was playing third base for Akron.
“She was right. She was the smartest person I’ve ever been around,” he said. “I still didn’t want to hear it.”
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