Purdue to celebrate Rick Mount and Indiana to celebrate Bob Knight, but...

[Da Coach]

Interesting article-
Gregg Doyel: Testing the anger of Bob Knight, Rick Mount

http://www.indystar.com/story/sports/columnists/gregg-doyel/2015/11/24/doyel-testing-anger-bob-knight-rick-mount/76309262/

Purdue is planning a celebration at their Mackey Arena for their game against Iowa on January 2 to honor their all-time scoring leader Rick Mount. They are having a Rick Mount bobblehead night to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Mount's 61 point scoring night against Iowa in 1966.
Indiana is planning a celebration at their game in the IU Assembly Hall on January 5 for their game against Wisconsin to commemorate the 40th anniversary of their 1976 Undefeated NCAA Championship team.

The problem is that Rick Mount has had no communication with Purdue for decades and nobody knows if he will come to the game. Likewise, Bob Knight has had nothing to do with Indiana for many years, and almost certainly will not show up for their celebration January 5th. But both schools plan on going ahead with the events.

The article outlines what Mount's and Knight's grievances are, but they sound like the 2 most pompous and stubborn men on the face of the earth.

[tornado]

In Knight's case- there certainly was an era when IU treated him very poorly -
but in Mount's case- Purdue has kinda always loved the guy - so that one is weird....
There are some schools that treat their legends pretty poorly - banning them from campus over incredibly petty personal disputes with an administrator, stripping them of their accomplishments, failing even to honor them even when they were true legends/National Players of the Year or Top Draft Picks, stabbing them in their backs, firing them unceremoniously even with a series of winning years and 30-win seasons, and even running them off their Boards and worse....
....I sure hope our school never does anything like that to our legendary players...

[lefty]

Man....life is too short to hold grudges. Knight has always been a bully IMO.
He could show some class and come back and I think the roof would come down...
I use to love watching Mount play....how many would he have scored with a 3 pt line?....those shots where he kind of faded away from the corners against Illinois is what I remember most....


I understand Indiana having the special day since it's a team thing...but why would Purdue honor Mount if he's not going to be there? Seems silly to me

[tornado]

but they are who they are- they are grudgeholders

[Chico]

In Knight's case- there certainly was an era when IU treated him very poorly -
but in Mount's case- Purdue has kinda always loved the guy - so that one is weird....
There are some schools that treat their legends pretty poorly - banning them from campus over incredibly petty personal disputes with an administrator, stripping them of their accomplishments, failing even to honor them even when they were true legends/National Players of the Year or Top Draft Picks, stabbing them in their backs, firing them unceremoniously even with a series of winning years and 30-win seasons, and even running them off their Boards and worse....
....I sure hope our school never does anything like that to our legendary players...

Yeah, we just fire coaches with a 32-3 record.

[lefty]

Yeah, we just fire coaches with a 32-3 record.

You know that was 30 years ago Chico??¦??¦??¦it's ok to let it go

[Chico]

You know that was 30 years ago Chico………it's ok to let it go

What's BU done since then? Oh that's right fire a coach that didn't have that great a record but took a team to the Final 16 and had 10,000 butts in the seats every game. As a life long BU fan, sorry, I won't let it go.

[basketball nut]

I was surprised to read that about Mount. I lived in Indy during those years and was in the stands at Butler when Butler pulled a major upset of Purdue. Mount had a great game. The real problem in the game was a PU player got into a fight w/a BU player and it ended up w/ 3-4 (don't remember anymore) players including 2 PU starters getting kicked out of that game.
That was a game I will never forget.

[Da Coach]

I agree that it is surprising that Rick Mount still harbors such animosity toward Purdue after all these years. He is certainly entitled to feel however he wants, but it doesn't make much sense. I watched a lot of Purdue's games in the Rick Mount era. He was a great shooter, but he was never an elite athlete. He had a terrific college career, but his lack of athleticism hurt him once he got to the ABA. Eventually, injuries shortened his pro career.
He played only 5 seasons in the ABA, had a career average of just 11.8 ppg, 1.7 rpg, and 2.4 apg in his 5 seasons in the pros with a three point percentage of just 31.7%. He retired at age 28.

It seems to me that Purdue had a lot to do with making him the famous player he is, and he should be grateful for that. But what do I know?

By the way, he is not in the basketball Hall of Fame, probably because his pro career was somewhat mediocre.

http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/m/mountri01.html

http://www.hoophall.com/hall-of-famers-index/

And wouldn't Purdue need his approval to do a "Rick Mount Bobblehead" night?