Knight, Bobby

Knight, (Robert) Bobby (1940–  ) basketball coach; born in Massillon, Ohio. He played on the Ohio State 1960 National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) champion team, then became assistant coach (1963) and head coach (1965–70) at West Point. He became coach at Indiana University in 1971 and led his team to three NCAA championships (1976, 1981, 1987); his Indiana teams never had a losing season. He coached the American team that won the Olympic gold medal in basketball in 1984 and the U.S. team that won the gold medal in the 1979 Pan American Games. He emphasized discipline and defense on the court, and his passion for winning occasionally got him into trouble; in 1979, as coach of the U.S. team at the Pan-American Games in San Juan, Puerto Rico, he was charged with aggravated assault against a police officer in the gymnasium; at the 1981 NCAA "final four," he put a bothersome Louisiana State University supporter in a trash can.