Nevada Basketball Pays Tribute to Bob Knight in NCAA Tournament Debut

On the day of Nevada basketball’s first game this season, the mentor of Wolf Pack coach Steve Alford died.

Bob Knight, who helped develop Alford into one of the nation’s top amateur players and a future NBA draft pick while coaching him at Indiana, passed away Nov. 1 with Nevada playing an exhibition against Stanislaus State later that night.

Alford has worn a patch reading ‘RMK’ — ‘Robert Montgomery Knight’ — this season to honor his former coach. And before what could be Nevada’s final game of the season — the Wolf Pack obviously hopes that’s not the case — Alford was asked what Knight would have thought of this year’s Nevada team, which is 26-7 entering Thursday’s first-round NCAA Tournament game against Dayton. After a thoughtful answer, Alford joked: ‘If anything, he’d probably be shocked it was somebody like me that is coaching a team that’s guarding well. That’s probably what he’d be most shocked about.’

Alford was always known for his offense as a player at Indiana where he led the Hoosiers to a national championship during his senior season under Knight. And while this year’s Wolf Pack team has been solid on offense, defensive gains have lifted Nevada to its most victories in a season under Alford. The Wolf Pack has gone from 156th in KenPom defense two years ago to 71st last year to 38th this season, the school’s best mark since 2018-19.

Nevada also has excelled at getting to the free throw line (24.8 times per game, ninth in the nation) and taking care of the ball (10 turnovers per game, 41st in the nation). Those two things plus great defense were recipes for success under Knight, who set the NCAA record with 902 wins en route to three national championships during his coaching career.

Alford said Knight would have enjoyed Nevada’s players for their all-around excellence. ‘I think for the majority of the season he would have really liked what he’d seen because I know what kind of characters we have on our team,’ Alford said. ‘These are high-character guys. They do the job in the classroom, they do the job in the community, they represent (Nevada well). You play for Coach Knight, you always know it’s about the front of the jersey. I think he would appreciate what our guys do and how hard they play.’

Alford continued to say this year’s Nevada team has adopted some of the same mindset of Knight’s great squads. ‘One of the things Coach was great about was going from the will to prepare and the art of going from being a hard-working team to a really good competing team, going to that next level of work,’ Alford said. ‘I think he would have been impressed with how we value the ball. We don’t beat ourselves very often. We take care of the basketball. We get good shots. Then we really try to guard.’

That defense must be stout Thursday against Dayton, which has an All-American post player in DaRon Holmes II surrounded by excellent shooters as the Flyers rank third in the nation at 40.3 percent shooting from three. Dayton has the nation’s 19th-best offense, per KenPom. ‘They’re hard to guard because they stretch you to the 3-point line, then they’ve got a pro that’s in the middle,’ Alford said. ‘It’s going to be a challenge to our defense.’

Dayton coach Anthony Grant applauded Nevada’s defense. ‘Defensively, they have great length,’ Grant said. ‘I think one of the top-50 defensive teams in terms of what they’ve been able to do nationally. They make it difficult for you.’

Nevada is the more experienced of the two teams with the Wolf Pack starting four seniors, including one in his sixth college season (K.J. Hymes) and two in their fifth year (Jarod Lucas, Kenan Blackshear). Nobody in Dayton’s rotation is listed as a senior with only one having played in an NCAA Tournament game (Nate Santos, four minutes at Pitt last year). Nevada, meanwhile, played in last year’s Big Dance with Alford hoping his team’s more veteran roster is ready for this big stage.

‘That experience has been one of the reasons why we’re back here,’ Alford said. ‘They tasted a little bit of it last year, but they wanted more of it. They’ve been able to accomplish a lot more this year along the lines. They’ve been very, very consistent. We knew we had a chance to get there. Being in a very demanding league like the Mountain West Conference, you knew you had to play well. We played really good basketball in January, February and March. We’re well-prepared because of the league we came from.’