Headlining the new issue of Sporting News Magazine: our list of sports' 50 greatest coaches of all time, as selected by a panel of 118 Hall of Famers, championship coaches and other experts.
John Wooden, who at UCLA won a record 10 Division I men's basketball championships in 12 years, was a runaway winner. SN's 1970 Sportsman of the Year picked up 57 first-place votes from the panel, which includes seven World Series-winning managers, four Super Bowl champion coaches and the winningest coaches in the NBA, NHL and college basketball.
"When I think of Coach Wooden, the first word that comes to mind is execution," said Gail Goodrich, who wrote an appreciation of his former coach in SN. "We never worried about the opponent, only about how we were going to play."
Green Bay Packers great Vince Lombardi came in second place in SN's rankings, picking up 20 first-place votes. Wrote Bart Starr, Lombardi's Hall of Fame quarterback: "(He said), 'Gentlemen, we are going to relentlessly chase perfection, knowing full well we will not catch it because nothing is perfect. But we are going to relentlessly chase it because in the process we will catch excellence.' He paused for a moment, got up even closer to those of us sitting up front, looked us in the eye and added, 'I am not remotely interested in being just good.' Wow."
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