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Looking at 68 teams in a March Madness bracket can be quite overwhelming, especially for those playing in the tournament.
However, former Duke player Jay Bilas said his legendary former head coach, Mike Krzyzewski, had a genius way of dumbing it down to take the pressure off the Blue Devils.
“I played for Coach K at Duke and in 1986, my senior year, was the second year of the 64 team,” Bilas told Pakinomist Digital in a recent interview. “And he broke the tournament down to basically a four-team tournament the first weekend. He talked about the opposite side of our bracket, the 32 teams opposite our side and said, ‘Look at all those teams in there,’ and started talking about how good some of them were. And then he says, ‘Who cares? Only one team comes out of what comes out well of what we play.” one team Monday night for the championship.’
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Duke Blue Devils head coach Mike Krzyzewski reacts during the first half of the game against the North Carolina Tar Heels during the 2022 NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament Final Four semifinal at Caesars Superdome on April 2, 2022 in New Orleans, Louisiana. (Jamie Squire/Getty Images)
“And so he gave us a bracket. It was a four-team bracket and we played at Greensboro in the first and second rounds. I think he called it the Greensboro Invitational and said, ‘That’s all we have to worry about.’ And we’re like, ‘Gee, we can handle that.’ He made it easier. And then the second week, same thing. We played at the Meadowlands – the Meadowlands Invitational. We played DePaul and then David Robinson and Navy were on the other side of it. So we were only dealing with a four-team tournament. Then we come to the Final Four, four-team tournament. And that really made it a lot easier.”
Like the rest of us, Bilas now watches the tournament as a fan. And this year, he’ll enjoy it with some ice-cold Garage Beer, founded by Travis and Jason Kelce.
Jay Bilas will enjoy March Madness with Garage Beer. (Garage beer)
“I like beer and I like garage,” Bilas joked, adding that the Kelce brothers are a key reason he wanted to advocate for the beverage this March Madness. “I probably shouldn’t talk about how much I like beer, but I like beer, and I like Garage Beer. And there’s nothing better than tournament time, and those two things go really well together. I try to avoid it when I’m on the air, but I’m like everybody else – when there’s a good game going, I like to crack one open.”
And despite likely being several Garage Beers deep throughout the tournament, there’s a good chance that Bilas, a self-proclaimed March Madness “nerd,” will be able to remember pretty much everything from this tournament.
But because of Coach K’s parenthetical practice, this encyclopedia in Bilas’ mind doesn’t have many pages in 1986.
“I can talk to you about plays that happened at almost any tournament and remember it. I can’t remember what happened in that tournament in 1986,” Bilas said. “Because all I cared about was what we did. I mean, it’s really remarkable. I don’t really remember anything else because of the way Coach K presented it to us and the way we approached it. And I know a lot of teams are doing it now, and I, at least speaking for myself, thought it was extraordinarily helpful for us.”
Duke head coach Mike Krzyzewski shouts during the first half of a college basketball game against Cal State Fullerton in the first round of the NCAA Tournament, Friday, March 18, 2022, in Greenville, SC (AP Photo/Chris Carlson)
The Blue Devils are No. 1 overall this year and are aiming for their first title since 2015.
