Rick Pitino

Richard Andrew "Rick" Pitino (born September 18, 1952) is an American basketball coach. Since 2001, he has been the head coach at the University of Louisville, and coached the Cardinals to the 2013 NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Championship. As a college head coach, Pitino has also served at Boston University, Providence College and the University of Kentucky, leading that program to the NCAA championship in 1996. In addition to his college coaching career, Pitino also served two stints in the NBA, coaching the New York Knicks for two seasons and the Boston Celtics for three and a partial fourth.

Pitino holds the distinction of being the only recognized men's coach in NCAA history to lead three different schools (Providence, Kentucky, and Louisville) to a Final Four and the only coach in the NCAA to lead two different schools to an NCAA National Championship (Kentucky and Louisville). Pitino is also one of only four coaches in NCAA history (along with Dean Smith, Mike Krzyzewski and Jim Boeheim) to take his school to the Final Four in four separate decades, one of only three coaches (along with Roy Williams and Jack Gardner) to have led two different programs to at least two Final Fours each, and one of only two coaches (along with Williams) to have led two different programs to at least three Final Fours each. In addition, Pitino has achieved a measure of success as an author and a motivational speaker. Pitino's election to the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame was officially announced on April 8 during the 2013 Final Four; he was inducted five months later.