How Bob Knight and Golf Got Mike Woodson into Coaching

Indiana coach Mike Woodson took an uncommon path to becoming an NBA coach, a story he told Monday night on his radio show.

Jack Ankony | Oct 31, 2023

How Bob Knight and Golf Got Mike Woodson into Coaching /

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Indiana Hoosiers

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. – When Mike Woodson retired from his 11-year NBA career in 1991, he spent a few years contemplating his next venture.

As an Indiana University graduate and All-Big Ten player under coach Bob Knight, Woodson made visits back to Bloomington and briefly worked in real estate.

"Hell, I never thought I would coach," Woodson said on Oct. 10 at Big Ten media days, reflecting his thoughts as a player.

During this in-between time of his career, he received a phone call from Cotton Fitzsimmons, who coached Woodson and the Kansas City Kings from 1981-84. Woodson was drafted 12th overall in 1980 by the New York Knicks, but he played just 11.7 minutes per game as a rookie.

It was with the Kings, under Fitzsimmons, that Woodson got his first big chance as a pro. During the 1981-82 season, Woodson started 74 games and averaged 16.1 points. The following year, he scored a career-high 18.2 points per game playing for Fitzsimmons.

They reconnected when Woodson retired, igniting his coaching career.

"He bamboozled me, man," Woodson said during his radio show Monday night.

Fitzsimmons invited Woodson to Phoenix for the NBA pre-draft camps, where Woodson had a chance to coach the budding prospects.

"The only reason I went out," Woodson said. "Was because he told me, hell, we could play golf every day."

But it didn't go how he expected, Woodson recalled Monday.

"We get 30 minutes into practice and [Fitzsimmons] says, 'Well, Woody, I got a tee time at 12 o'clock.'"

"Okay, let's go," Woodson responded.

"Well, somebody's got to stay here and coach the team," Fitzsimmons said.

"Well, what do you mean? You told me I could play golf," Woodson said.

Fitzsimmons left Woodson, confused and inexperienced at the time, to coach the potential NBA draft picks.

"I was lost," Woodson said. "I was like, 'What the hell am I going to do?' I mean, these guys are looking at me like, 'This cat don't have a clue of what he's doing,' which I didn't. So I got through that embarrassing moment, and from that point on, I started to pursue coaching."

For the following three years, Woodson coached in the NBA Summer League in Los Angeles. He had the opportunity to handpick his roster, putting together a 12-man squad of free agents. They played against NBA teams, and Woodson developed as a young coach and perhaps as a recruiter, too.

Woodson considers those years as the reason he was discovered by Chris Ford, an 11-year NBA veteran who coached in the league for over 20 years. Ford set up a dinner for Woodson to meet with Herb Kohl, the former owner of the Milwaukee Bucks. Kohl was also a U.S. senator from Wisconsin from 1989-2013. His family founded the Kohl's department stores, and the University of Wisconsin basketball arena is named after him.

"I go in and I sit down at dinner," Woodson said. "And the question comes up. [Kohl] says, 'Do you know coach Knight?' I looked at him and said, 'Is this a joke question? I mean, are you serious?'

"Yeah, I need to know if you know coach Knight," Kohl said, as Woodson recalls.

"Yeah, I know coach Knight."

"Well, I'll tell you what," Kohl said. "I've always been intrigued by coach Knight ... If you get coach Knight to give me a call between now and tomorrow morning, you got a job."

"So I got right on the horn," Woodson said. "I called coach Knight and said, 'Hey man, you got to make this phone call for me.' And he makes the phone call, and next morning I had the job as an assistant coach in Milwaukee."

That's how Woodson's coaching career took off.

Woodson join the Bucks' staff in 1996 and stayed there through the 1999 season. He held assistant coaching roles with the Cleveland Cavaliers, Philadelphia 76ers and Detroit Pistons before earning his first head coaching job with the Atlanta Hawks in 2004.

He got a second head coaching job with the New York Knicks in 2012 and remained in the NBA until 2021, when he returned to his alma mater to coach the Hoosiers.

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