Away From Basketball, Bob Knight Starred in an Unforgettable Indiana Golf Instruction Show
In the aftermath of Bob Knight’s death, many familiar video clips recirculated of the Hall of Fame college basketball coach: throwing a chair at Assembly Hall in 1985, brandishing a whip in a press conference at the ’92 NCAA tournament, telling Indiana University fans in ’94 that when he died he wanted to be buried upside down so critics could kiss his ass.
And on social media, outtakes from an old golf show featuring the coach and plenty of colorful language made the rounds again.
Sam Carmichael still laughs about those but prefers to remember the Knight he knew, whose offseason passions included hunting, fishing and golf.
“He was very gracious, very giving,” says Carmichael, the 84-year-old head professional at Martinsville Golf Club, about a half hour north of Indiana University. “And he could break 80. He was a decent player.”
Knight picked up his golf clubs after basketball seasons were over.
Sports Illustrated
In the late ’80s, when Carmichael was coaching the IU women’s golf team, Knight called and asked him to stop by the basketball office at Assembly Hall. Knight had an idea for a golf show in which the PGA pro would give tips to Knight. The basketball coach even came up with the name: It would be called Golf Your Way.
The half-hour show ran for four years in the summer on Sunday nights on WTTV-4 in Indianapolis and Bloomington, another small way the legendary coach was tied into the fabric of Indiana.
“We would tape a show, change clothes, do another one, three shows a day,” Carmichael says. “He would pick me up at the club here and say, ‘Sam, what are we going to do today?’ I’d say, ‘We should do this, this and this,’ and he’d say, ‘Well, I think we should do this, this and this.’ It was his idea.”
Knight took instruction from Carmichael well, dating to 1979 when a mutual friend asked the golfer to give a couple of swing tips to the coach. A friendship formed, and the two played regularly after basketball seasons ended.
“He was pretty even. Once in a while, he’d get angry,” Carmichael says. “One time, he hit a shot on No. 12 at Martinsville and threw his club. I said, ‘Coach, you’ve got to stay calm and not get so upset when you miss a shot.’
“He looked at me, ‘Sam, you know that’s not one of my best attributes.’”
Knight’s anger boiled over a few times on Golf Your Way, most memorably in a bunker scene where he got increasingly mad as poor shots piled up. (Note: The video below has considerable profanity.)
Carmichael says Knight had been sticking every shot to within four feet of the hole, but the cameras malfunctioned and captured none of them. Once the cameras were fixed, Knight couldn’t recreate the good shots, and his temper flared.
There were other instances of rage that never made the show, but an outtake bootleg video quietly released after the show’s run had everything. VHS copies were shared and reshared, particularly among Hoosiers in the pre-internet era. Today it lives on YouTube as the lasting memory of Bob Knight playing golf.
“He didn’t know about it until later on,” Carmichael says. “I don’t think he was real pleased with it, but we never talked about it. He just let it go.”
In a phone conversation Thursday, Carmichael shared memories that went well beyond a television show. If he had a recruit in town, he could take the player to Knight’s office for a conversation. One year, Knight went with Carmichael’s women’s team on a spring break trip to Florida, playing with the team and using connections to get them all on a course at Disney World.
And there was the time the two were playing golf and Carmichael took a phone call on the 10th green, closing a deal to get sponsorship for one of his former players to turn pro.
“After I hung up, he said, ‘What was that all about, Sam?’” Carmichael says. “I said, ‘We’re going to try to put a player on tour and sponsoring him for a three-year period.’”
“‘Goddamn, Sam, why the hell didn’t you ask me? Well, you can count me in.’
“That’s just the kind of person he was.”