Blue Devil Country

Highway to Heaven: How Duke Basketball Treasure Coach K Shapes Lives

Mike Krzyzewski has paved the way for countless Duke basketball players and supporters to recognize their potential.

Matt Giles

Retired Duke basketball head coach Mike Krzyzewski
Retired Duke basketball head coach Mike Krzyzewski / Matt Giles-Duke Blue Devils On SI
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No stop signs. No toll booths. Just the unobstructed freedom — albeit with a speed limit — to accelerate one's inner drive while appreciating the beauty of the journey. That's what 77-year-old Duke basketball legend Mike Krzyzewski still seeks to deliver more of, even two years into his retirement from coaching.

And that's what the newly minted Coach K Highway, a three-mile stretch of N.C. 751 through the Duke Forest from Kerley Road to Duke University Road, is all about.

Or at least that's what the five-time national champion and all-time wins leader in NCAA men's hoops seemed to suggest during his speech at Friday's dedication ceremony on Coach K Court in Cameron Indoor Stadium. He recognized the symbolism in what is the final leg of his drive into work as an active ambassador for the university he and his family cherish.

It's about the roadblocks removed by the Emily K Center, named after his mother and less than a two-mile drive after turning on Duke University Road from Coach K Highway.

"The single biggest untapped resource in our country is the talent that can be found in lower-income communities," Krzyzewski explained about the Emily K Center's mission in Durham before reeling off many of the prestigious institutions that its 2024 graduating class, including several first-generation college students, is heading to in the fall.

"I get chills thinking about [the untapped resource] because it's there. It's there everywhere."

Coach K Highway is also about Krzyzewski's role as a board member in helping empower the life-saving pursuits of the Duke University Children's Hospital and The V Foundation for Cancer Research.

It's about his former players and other Duke products who continue pushing the pedal to the metal in their professional careers, making Coach K and The Brotherhood proud in the process.

"We have a lot of players in the NBA and coaches," Krzyzewski, now moonlighting as an adviser to the league, noted after the ceremony when Duke Blue Devils On SI asked him to comment on the three past Blue Devils set to compete in the upcoming NBA Finals. "Behind the scenes, we have a general manager or two, or a president...

"To see [Boston Celtics star Jayson Tatum], and Amile Jefferson is on the staff. Obviously, [Dallas Mavericks rookie center Dereck Lively II] going through the agony and the tragedy of his mom passing away. And really, the reemergence to the top level in the NBA with [Mavericks guard Kyrie Irving]; I mean, Kyrie has always been a great player, none better than he is right now."

And it's about current and future Duke basketball talents under the direction of the program's two-time national champ (2010 as a player, 2015 as an assistant) in the 36-year-old Jon Scheyer.

"Jon's done a terrific job," Krzyzewski said. "I mean, two 27-win seasons, really good advancement in the NCAA Tournament. But he's done it really the right way. I don't think there's been a blip at all.

"He was prepared for this, and he's shown that. And he's just gonna keep growing, as I did in [my first few seasons]. But he's starting off in a much better place, as It took us a long time to get 54 wins, much more than two seasons."

Finally, although only alluded to with various rivalry-fueled jokes throughout the ceremony, Coach K Highway must be about Duke basketball fans, especially those of the hardened variety from North Carolina.

Throughout Coach K's 42-year reign, that brand of North Carolinian made it their daily duty both as children and adults, whether at school or work, to embrace the opposite route of the UNC and NC State enthusiasts who would tirelessly question the intelligence and morality of anyone who dared to root for that so-called "Ratface" and his Blue Devils.

All in all, the act of defending Coach K, which he undoubtedly made simpler to do via his construction of a bonafide blueblood that consistently seized bragging rights for its followers on and around Tobacco Road, helped build character.

After all, just imagine the harsh language from devout Tar Heel classmates or co-workers if someone were to simply point out that it took the state a few years longer to award a highway to Coach K than it did for the names of UNC's Roy Williams and Dean Smith to receive about three miles apiece of I-40, despite Krzyzewski singlehandedly matching their combined national championship tally.

Coach K Highway might be the road less traveled among fanbases in "The Tar Heel State." But the places and sights it leads to are impossible to ignore.

Even UNC fan Roy Cooper, the governor of North Carolina, who was in attendance for the equivalent Roy Williams and Dean Smith ceremony in February 2022 at halftime of Coach K's final visit to the Smith Center (an 87-67 Duke victory), admitted as much in the video message he graciously gifted Krzyzewski's ceremony.

"It will no doubt inspire others," Cooper said about Coach K Highway, "to travel the road to their kind of greatness."

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Matt Giles

MATT GILES

Matt Giles is the editor and publisher of FanNation's Blue Devil Country and All Tar Heels, covering the Duke Blue Devils and UNC Tar Heels on SI.com.

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