PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Rick Pitino has matched wits with Mike Krzyzewski and Dean Smith, with John Thompson and Jim Boeheim, with Roy Williams, Lute Olson and more, but the only coach he has seen as a true rival — a "disliking-each-other rival," in his words — is Jim Calhoun, a bitter nemesis during Pitino’s stints at Boston University and Providence.
When Calhoun was at Northeastern, the Terriers’ crosstown adversary, the two would shoot daggers at one another in front of crowds numbering in the hundreds, Pitino recalled. This rancor continued when the pair migrated to the Big East, with Pitino taking both matchups during the 1986-87 Friars’ magical run to the Final Four.