Some phrases are versatile enough, or maybe just vague enough, to be glowing praise and cutting criticism -- both, or either, all at the same time. Like, say, this one:
Rick Pitino is one of a kind.
It isn't easy to summarize the breadth of three-decade coaching careers. In Pitino's case, it's almost impossible. But if there is a phrase up to the job, it is that one -- enough to include both the basketball brilliance and the off-court seediness that have in recent years dueled for prominence in Pitino's story.
The sordid side scored its latest victory last October, when former escort Katina Powell's book, "Breaking Cardinal Rules," alleged that former Louisville assistant coach Andre McGee used cash and tickets to pay escorts to have sex with recruits and players in the player dormitories of Pitino's program.
On Thursday, it pushed its way to the front once more. In a notice of allegations sent to Louisville president Neville Pinto, the NCAA Committee on Infractions alleged that Pitino -- while not complicit nor charged with any direct violation himself -- "did not monitor" his assistant coach and failed to "actively [look] for red flags."
In other words: Pitino didn't know, but he should have.
Overall, the notice was a minor victory for Louisville, as ESPN's Dana O'Neil explained; the school avoided charges of lack of institutional control and failure to monitor, which have traditionally led to the committee's most severe penalties. But the NCAA's reasonable insistence on holding coaches responsible for what happens at their programs -- the same way, say, a bank CEO is responsible for the widespread scamming of customers -- is likely to bind Pitino to the words "sex" and "scandal" in the popular consciousness long after his career is done.
Because it's not the first time. Before there was Katina Powell, there was Karen Cunagin Sypher. In 2009, Pitino revealed that he had been the target of an extortion attempt by Sypher and her husband, Louisville equipment manager Tim Sypher, shortly before the two were arraigned and charged in U.S. District Court. The FBI was involved, Pitino announced at the time and ... no, seriously: The FBI was involved.
College sports can throw its fair share of David Lynch-ian weirdness at the wall, but this was something new. Later, in court, Pitino admitted to having sex with Cunagin Sypher at a Louisville restaurant, then giving her $3,000 when she later asked for money for an abortion. The legal process forced Pitino to reveal personal details on a nightmarishly embarrassing scale, to say nothing of the moral chastisement shoveled his way.
It was easy then -- as it is now -- to forget the reason why Pitino kept his job in the wake of the Sypher disaster: Because he's an incredible basketball coach.
Now 64 years old, on the eve of his 31st season as a collegiate head coach, Pitino has won 743 games, averaged 24.7 wins per season, claimed 10 regular-season conference titles, 12 conference tournaments, 53 NCAA tournament victories. He is the only man in NCAA history to lead three different programs to a Final Four and the only one to win national titles at two different schools.
His first, at Kentucky, popularized a demoralizing full-court press, a tactic so effective, with a team so talented, that both Pitino and the Boston Celtics thought it could work in the NBA. It didn't, and after four seasons Pitino returned to college basketball, this time at UK's hated rival.
Nearly two decades after his first, Pitino would win his second championship. The "Untouchables'" 1996 title was brute force; the 2013 triumph was a tour de force, a showcase for the more subtle, more flexible defensive mastery Pitino wields like a magic wand.
The Cardinals have ranked among the nation's five best defenses in each of the past six seasons, and eight of the past 10, and they have done so with merely good, but never overwhelming, talent. Pitino doesn't press as much as he used to, though his teams can. They play a lot of zone, but also a lot of man, and a lot of in-between. Occasionally, Pitino will clap his hands, or stomp his foot, and in an instant his defenders will execute a perfect half-court trap -- almost as if the coach was queuing commands in a video game.
He might be the greatest defensive mind in the history of the college game. That is not an exaggeration.
At a news conference Thursday, as Pitino insisted he was not guilty of failing to monitor his staff ("I'm guilty of trusting someone," Pitino said), the coach rattled off a long list of his former assistants: Billy Donovan, Mick Cronin, Andy Enfield, Jim O'Brien, Frank Vogel, Herb Sendek, Tubby Smith. The point was about trust, but the reminder was implied: The man's legacy as a coach runs as deep and wide as any in the sport. That is how he will be remembered.
Yet there will also be the other side. It will be nearly impossible to shake entirely.
Odds are, this season or (more likely) next, Pitino, yet another legendary coach staring down some form of scandal in the twilight years of his career, will face some sort of suspension, and will be forced to watch his team from home. The defense he will see -- not man, not zone, maybe both, maybe neither -- will be the kind only he could have devised. The scandal that forced him to that vantage in the first place will be seedier than any college basketball scandal since the last -- even weirder -- scandal involving Rick Pitino.
He really is one of a kind. This is a compliment. It is also not.