Calipari, Pitino not close, but share 'great' respect

PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- Rick Pitino vs. John Calipari, Round 5. It's on.

The two decorated, animated coaches will be center stage when Pitino leads No. 2 seed St. John's against Calipari and No. 10 Arkansas in the second round of the men's NCAA basketball tournament Saturday at Amica Mutual Pavilion.

Mutual respect? Absolutely.

A friendship? Not so fast.

"I certainly have great respect for him, but we're not really close. Everybody tried to talk that way," Pitino said Friday, the day after St. John's overcame early jitters against No. 15 seed Omaha before pulling away with a dominant second half to win by 30 and set up the matchup with Arkansas

"I don't know a whole lot about him except he's a terrific basketball coach. At a very young age, I knew him really well ... but years have gone by and I don't think we have been to dinner one time in our lifetime."

But they've been on the sideline as opposing collegiate head coaches 23 times overall, with Calipari holding a 13-10 edge.

As for the NCAA tournament, Saturday's fifth matchup between the 72-year-old Pitino and 66-year-old Calipari ties for the second most between two head coaches in tourney history -- one behind Duke's Mike Krzyzewski and Michigan State's Tom Izzo. Pitino won the first two, Calipari the most recent two.

"He's on Chapter 2 of his new book and we're on Chapter 1," Calipari said, in reference to Pitino's second season at St. John's and his first at Arkansas, which pulled away in the final minutes to beat No. 7 seed Kansas on Thursday to advance. "It's both of us writing another story and being able to come back here."

St. John's (31-4) has the country's No. 1 defense and is on a nine-game winning streak. Arkansas (21-13) played one of its best games of the season Thursday, led by Jonas Aidoo's 22 points.

Both coaches reflected Friday on the story of how they initially connected -- at the Five-Star Basketball Camp when Calipari was a camper and Pitino a counselor. Calipari said he looked up to Pitino at that time, and later remembered Pitino returning as a speaker when he became a counselor.

Pitino recalled how he advocated for Calipari to land his first head-coaching job at UMass, his alma mater, in 1988. He acknowledged he never would have imagined Calipari would have led the once-dormant program to a No. 1 ranking, which included a trip to the Final Four in 1996 when Pitino's Kentucky squad defeated Calipari's upstart Minutemen.

Calipari's time at Memphis (2000-09) and then Kentucky (2009-24) coincided with Pitino's at Louisville (2001-17), which added more compelling chapters to the history between them.

"He was at Louisville, I was at Kentucky -- you're not going to be friends when you got those two jobs," Calipari said Friday. "You're not going to be enemies but ... you know, I respect coaches that can really do this well, and if you can do it over a long, long period of time, I really respect you."

Calipari said he has long studied Pitino and noted how his teams always "play hard and with a winning attitude." At the same time, the distance between them was evident when Calipari was asked Friday what he thought about Pitino imploring Kentucky fans not to boo Calipari upon his return to Rupp Arena for the first time since his departure in early February.

"I would rather have a Christmas card, but that was nice of him," Calipari said.

Said Pitino: "We're both Italian. We both love the game. I think that's pretty much where the similarities end."