'He’s good enough being Jon Scheyer': Why Duke's next head coach will chart his own course in replacing Coach K
The game was one of the most hyped in Illinois high school basketball history.
Jon Scheyer vs. Derrick Rose. The two best players in Illinois at the time, Rose’s Chicago Simeon got past Scheyer’s defending state champion Glenbrook North in the 2006 state playoffs. Scheyer still ended up winning Illinois’ Mr. Basketball by a landslide that season, setting several state records and scoring 21 points in 75 seconds in one game. Rose, of course, went on to become the 2011 NBA MVP before knee injuries derailed his All-Star career. Scheyer went on to win a national championship with Duke in 2010 as an All-American.
“Jon was the most competitive player I’ve ever been around,” said former Glenbrook North coach Dave Weber. “Normally, when you’re down 13 with 1:30 left, you know the game’s over. Jon would fight till the very end. When he’d score 50 points in a game, it was like he was in the twilight zone making shot after shot. But that was because he was relentless with his preparation – the way he played and practiced. Every drill he’d have to win. And he was a true student of the game, probably watching film more than me. Even though I was his coach, he sure taught me a lot.”
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But Scheyer’s once-prolific playing career was never meant to extend into the pros. A serious eye injury hindered his NBA dreams, and despite making a pretty penny playing top-level pro basketball overseas, Scheyer said he felt a calling that was pulling him in another direction.
“When you think about timing, how much it has to do with everything in life, it’s pretty darn important,” the 34-year-old Scheyer, who latched onto Mike Krzyzewski’s staff as an assistant at just 25, told Paste BN. “Sometimes, things don’t go as you plan and you have to pivot. I’ve always been a guy who follows my instincts and never waver from that. Once I felt like playing wasn’t in my heart the same, and after talking it over with coach (Krzyzewski), I knew coaching was the natural transition, the natural fit. (Coach K) always taught me how to (live) for others’ dreams as well as my own. I’ll always be a player at heart, but you sort of have to get over yourself. Then you realize what you’re meant to give to players you’re coaching.”
The end of Jon Scheyer the player paved the way for Jon Scheyer the coach.
And the earlier-than-expected career swap is what aligned Scheyer with Krzyzewski’s retirement trajectory. The timing was, indeed, everything.
Krzyzewski handpicked his protégé to take over the kingdom of success he cultivated over four decades with the Blue Devils. “He’s one of the smartest coaches in the country,” Krzyzewski said at the announcement in June. “Nobody knows that as well as I know that. The players know that.”
Much was made over the last decade of who would replace the legendary Coach K. For a duration, it didn’t seem as though Scheyer would be old enough or experienced enough in time. But much like a middle-of-the-pack distance runner, Scheyer used a strong kick on the bell lap while other top assistants all gradually went elsewhere (Chris Collins to Northwestern, Steve Wojciechowski to Marquette, Jeff Capel to Pittsburgh).
When it came time for Krzyzewski’s retirement, there was no need for an external search because the Blue Devils were already housing the most up-and-coming coach in the country – making Scheyer’s promotion from associate head coach to head-coach-in-waiting a no-brainer.
“Jon Scheyer would’ve been a home-run hire as a head coach anywhere he would’ve gone. The guy is a young star in this business, whether people realize it yet or not,” ESPN analyst Jay Bilas said. “The challenge is he has the toughest act to follow in the history of sports. There’s not a coach on any level that’s done what Coach K has done. Ever. John Wooden didn’t do everything with the same kind of spotlight – on television and the internet – as Coach K did.
“But what separates Jon, even though this will be his first head coaching job, is he already knows who he is as a coach. He already has his voice. He knows while he’s following Coach K, he doesn’t have to be Coach K. He’s good enough being Jon Scheyer.”
Weber saw that blossoming coach identity four years ago when Scheyer, still in his late 20s at the time, invited him to a Duke practice and his former teen star handed him a playbook reel of all the plays he planned to run as a head coach.
“He’s been ready for this,” Weber said. “Just like he was as a player, he’ll be relentless – coaching and recruiting. No one will outwork him.”
Scheyer is already responding to the astronomical Duke pressure before officially taking over, hauling in the currently No. 1-ranked recruiting class for 2022 (per 247 Sports) thanks to the commitment of No. 2 prospect Dereck Lively, a 7-foot-1 standout who picked Scheyer’s Blue Devils over John Calipari’s Kentucky Wildcats and Juwan Howard’s Michigan Wolverines.
“I’m blessed with this opportunity to coach somewhere I truly love, so the sales (pitch) is easy for me,” Scheyer said. “I still plan to keep winning championships here. That’s not going to stop. I wouldn’t say it’s pressure I feel. It’s more just the level of responsibility because of what Coach and Duke is all about – as a global brand in the world and how people take pride in our program. I don’t take it lightly, but at the same time it doesn’t overwhelm me.”
Scheyer said 2021-22 won’t be easy to compartmentalize because he’ll have a balancing act of emotions in Krzyzewski’s final season: Seeing the Blue Devils’ aspirations from a coach-in-waiting perspective – where Coach K wants all the press to focus on the team and not his last hurrah. And then seeing the curtains closing for the 74-year-old mentor who helped shape him as a man – player, coach, husband and father.
“It’s a double-edged sword for me,” Scheyer said. “That’s my coach right there. I know he’ll be mad at me for saying this, but it’s his final season. For me and the players, when you’re trying to do something to the best of your ability, you have to naturally feel something. We’re going to follow his lead, but this season is emotional. That emotion is important to fuel this year’s team.”
Assessing Duke’s roster for the upcoming season, Scheyer said all the pieces are there for a special send-off season. Despite losing top players Matthew Hurt and Jalen Johnson to the NBA draft, the group coming in is brimming with new talent, particularly in the frontcourt where No. 2-ranked freshman (per 247 Sports) Paolo Banchero and five-star forward AJ Griffin will pair with returnee Mark Williams.
“Guys didn’t just come here to play in the NCAA Tournament, they came here for national championships,” Scheyer said. “Missing (March Madness) the last two years motivates our returning players, it motivates us as coaches. Sometimes, you don’t like that something challenging happens to you, but you need it to happen to you to lead to something else.”
That motto of accepting a setback to pave way for a greener pasture is one Scheyer knows well.
Back in grade school, the words from a Krzyzewski autograph – from when the two first began their relationship – still permeate: To Jonathan. Work hard and always try your best.
“What people who don’t know him don’t get to see is just how unbelievably kind he is,” Scheyer said.
Scheyer has seen Coach K up close as a player and assistant. And that might be his final before stepping fully into the Duke spotlight.
“I may be more emotional than coach at times, knowing it’s his last time doing this,” Scheyer said. “But I think that’s a good thing.”
Follow college basketball reporter Scott Gleeson on Twitter @ScottMGleeson