Somewhere in the Kentucky angst which followed Duke's win over Butler is the begrudging acknowledgment that Coach K matched Adolph Rupp's four national titles, with the following question: who is better?
As the article suggests, parity changes things. But what it doesn't suggest is this: Rupp never had to deal with a 64 team tournament, nor with being shipped anywhere. He was in the same regional year after year, and the tournament, if we recall, was only 16 teams.
Aside from that, here's a quick question: during Rupp's era, what was the second-best SEC team? Tennessee? Alabama? Auburn? Florida? Georgia? LSU? Between 1942 and 1974, teams other than Kentucky went on to the NCAAs a grand total of six times. It should be noted that three teams turned down bids in the 50's because they were unwilling to deal with integrated opponents.
Even so, UK faced no real competition in the SEC for decades and got to the Final Four in a weekend.
Rupp had a tremendous career, although questions about cheating and racism follow him still. Given the easier conference and NCAA path he had, it's hard not to argue that Krzyzewski has had a much more difficult path to greatness.
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