Former University of Kentucky star Jamal Mashburn believes that Rick Pitino deserves another opportunity to coach in either college basketball or the NBA.
Check out his comments from Forbes:
Jamal Mashburn Sr. goes way back with Rick Pitino.
The Bronx, N.Y. native played for Pitino in the early 1990s at Kentucky and they have remained close ever since. Now Mashburn believes his old coach deserves another shot at coaching — either in college or the NBA.
“Coach Pitino at the end of the day is a Hall of Fame coach, but at the end of the day he’s a Hall of Fame teacher,” Mashburn, 46, said by phone from Miami this week where he is helping his son Jamal Jr. with the college recruiting process. “And I think he wants to be in that particular mode of being around the kids. He loves being in the gym, he loves teaching kids. He loves to impart information, he loves being around that youthful energy.
“I hope he gets an opportunity to get back into coaching. The college level, I think that’s going to be a wait-and-see period. The professional level, with his credentials, I think he deserves to be a head coach rather than an assistant but he has to wait and see if someone’s going to take that chance.”
Pitino coached last season at Panathinaikos in Greece. He led the team to the Greek Cup and Greek Championship.
