Tag: Jeff Capel

Everything we know about the beef between Jeff Capel, Jason Capel and UNC

So much for the “Carolina Family,” right?

Pitt won its third straight game Wednesday night, beating the North Carolina Tar Heels for the third straight time in the Dean Dome. Jamarius Burton sank a pair of free throws with 3.4 seconds left to give the Panthers the lead for the final time, and Nike Sibande got a hand on Caleb Love’s last effort shot attempt with 0.6 seconds left to seal the victory.

But folks might quickly forget how Pitt won this game or how Carolina lost it because what happened after the game sort of overshadowed everything.

When we look back on this game, we might refer to it as, “The Jason Capel Game.”

After Pitt won, its players piled into the hallway outside of the visitors’ locker room (which is right next to the media workroom at the Smith Center), hooting and hollering in celebration. When they settled down, the coaches came around the corner, and Pitt assistant coach Jason Capel was yelling. And not in a celebratory manner.

“Y’all gonna disrespect me?” Capel shouted. “All I did for this program? Y’all gonna boo me? I held this [expletive] together when Matt Doherty tore it apart. [Expletive] that [expletive].”

Jason Capel played at UNC from 1998 through 2002. He was a starter on a Final Four team in 2000, but he was also a senior captain on one of the worst teams in UNC history – the one coached by Matt Doherty that went 8-20 in the 2001-02 campaign. Some UNC fans still feel a certain type of way about that era of Carolina basketball, apparently.

And tensions between Capel and his alma mater have been tense for a while.

After the game, Capel told the Raleigh News & Observer in a text message, “Shouldn’t be a story. I shouldn’t be a story. Pitt winning should be the story.”

But it’s a little too late for that.

Here’s what we know about the beef between Jason Capel and UNC.

Oklahoma Sooners All-Time NCAA Tournament history

A look back at the 13 NCAA Tournament appearances for the Oklahoma Sooners. In 2016 they reached the Final Four for the fifth time overall.

Before the season even began for the Oklahoma Sooners men’s basketball team, the coaches put out their Big 12 preseason rankings. The Sooners led by head coach Lon Kruger were picked to finish 6th in the standings. A lot has changed since the rankings came out. It is a big reason why Kruger is among 15 coaches vying for the Naismith Coach of the Year award.

Preseason Rankings:

Ranking Team Points First Place Votes
1 Baylor Bears 79 7
2 Kansas Jayhawks 73 3
3 West Virginia Mountaineers 61 0
4 Texas Longhorns 58 0
5 Texas Tech Red Raiders 53 0
6 Oklahoma Sooners 39 0
7 Oklahoma State Cowboys 35 0
8 Iowa State Cyclones 19 0
9 Texas Christian Horned Frogs 18 0
10 Kansas State Wildcats 15 0

As it sits right now the Sooners are second in the Big 12 standings as they march closer to the conference tournament and NCAA Tournament. The latest bracketology from USA TODAY Sports have Oklahoma as a No. 3 seed in the tournament. They missed out last season due to the cancellation of basketball tournaments due to the coronavirus pandemic. Kruger has this team just on the verge of returning.

Since the year 2000, Oklahoma has played in 13 tournaments.

A full breakdown of each tourney run for the Sooners:

Oklahoma’s Joe Castiglione named best athletic director among NCAA Division I-FBS

It shouldn’t come to surprise to anyone that Joe Castiglione has the utmost respect amongst his peers and national media around the country.

It shouldn’t come to surprise to anyone that Oklahoma athletic director Joe Castiglione has the utmost respect amongst his peers and national media around the country.

The leader of the Sooners’ athletic department has kept Oklahoma as one of the few self-sufficient athletic departments in the country. Castiglione has handled nearly every situation with a progressive, classy thought process.

But he has also made some hires that have helped him become Stadium’s No. 1 athletic director amongst NCAA Division 1-FBS schools.

Castiglione arrived at Oklahoma in 1998 and then hired Bob Stoops in 1999. Stoops would go on to become the all-time winningest coach in the football program’s history while leading the Sooners to a national championship in 2000, a bowl game in every season and 10 Big 12 Championships.

He would go on to hire Jeff Capel to replace Kelvin Sampson and then Lon Kruger to replace Capel. The two hires combined to go to eight NCAA Tournaments, two Elite Eight appearances and one Final Four appearance.

Then, Castiglione’s most recent hire is current head coach Lincoln Riley, who took the baton from Stoops in the summer of 2017. Riley has done nothing but continue where Stoops left off. Oklahoma has won three-straight Big 12 Championships and made three College Football Playoffs in Riley’s first three years.

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WATCH: Duke’s Coach K apologizes after yelling at Cameron Crazies to ‘shut up’

Coach K went off on Duke students over a chant about Jeff Capel.

Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski is apologetic following the No. 9 Blue Devils’ 79-67 win versus Pittsburgh. The Hall of Fame coach interrupted the Cameron Crazies’ “sit with us,” chant during the first half of Tuesday night’s game.

Krzyzewski crossed the court from Duke’s (17-3, 7-2 ACC) bench and yelling at the young fans to “Shut up.” The crazies were cheering at Pitt head coach Jeff Capel, who played at Duke and was an assistant on Krzyzewski’s staff for seven seasons before leaving Durham for the Panthers’ head job in 2018. It’s routine for the Duke student section to invite former players (or even committed high school players) to their side of the court to “sit with us.” But, it turns out Coach K couldn’t quite hear anything other than Capel’s name.

“I don’t know if I made a mistake on that, but I’ve never heard another coach’s name yelled out in the middle of the first half when we’re in a war with the team,” Krzyzewski said postgame. “I don’t know if they were saying, ‘Come sit with me.’ We got a different look at what the hell was going on. I thought it was something personal…. I apologize to the students for that.”

Krzyzewski emphasized that more than anything, he wanted the students to understand Capel is one of Duke’s own and added that once he heard the name in the middle of the game, he didn’t exactly waltz over and ask what exactly was being said.

The Duke coach offered up a solution that included cheering for the Blue Devils, saying “Leave the other guy alone.”

The Crazies without taunting? Feels like that goes a bit against their reputation.

Duke’s Coach K apologizes after yelling at Cameron Crazies to ‘shut up,’ for chanting at Pitt coach

Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski is apologetic following the No. 9 Blue Devils’ 79-67 win versus Pittsburgh. The Hall of Fame coach interrupted the Cameron Crazies’ “Sit with us,” chant during the first half of Tuesday night’s game.

Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski is apologetic following the No. 9 Blue Devils’ 79-67 win versus Pittsburgh. The Hall of Fame coach interrupted the Cameron Crazies’ “Sit with us,” chant during the first half of Tuesday night’s game.

Jeff Capel had no problem with the Cameron Crazies chant that infuriated Coach K

Capel responded on Twitter.

Jeff Capel is a Duke legend.

He was beloved a player and was a Blue Devils assistant starting  in 2011 until he was hired by Pittsburgh to be the Panthers’ head coach in 2018.

So you could understand why Duke’s die-hard fan section, the Cameron Crazies, would target Capel with a cheer during Tuesday’s game, a chant — “Jeff Capel, sit with us” — that was all in good fun.

You could also understand why Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski might misinterpret that chant as taking a shot at a Duke legend, which is why Coach K went off, screaming at the Crazies to “shut up!!!”

Krzyzewski apologized, thinking the chant was personal and suggested other chants:

Capel later tweeted he took “no offense” and retweeted a note a Duke fan had snapped from the “dirt sheet” that the student section gets to taunt opponents, which said “nothing bad to say here, love you Capel”:

It was all a big misunderstanding.

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