Decades after it spent weeks at #1 on the New York Times bestseller list, A Season on the Brink remains the most celebrated basketball book ever written—an unforgettable chronicle of his year spent following the Indiana Hoosiers and their fiery coach Bob Knight. Granted unprecedented access to legendary coach Bob Knight and the Indiana Hoosiers during the 1985–86 season, John Feinstein saw and heard it all—practices, team meetings, strategy sessions, and midgame huddles—as the team worked to return to championship form. The result is an unforgettable chronicle that not only captures the drama and pressure of big-time college basketball but also paints a vivid portrait of a complex, brilliant coach as he walks the fine line between genius and madness. This anniversary edition features an updated Introduction by Feinstein. Sports Illustrated ’s #6 Sports Book of All Time “Nothing less than extraordinary.” — The Chicago Tribune “Riveting . . . Perhaps the best basketball book ever written.” —Dayton Daily News “ A Season on the Brink is not just my favorite sports book of all time, but one of my favorite books in general. Everything that’s important and disturbing about basketball can be understood through its details.” —Chuck Klosterman “The best writer of sports books in America today.” — The Boston Globe “Bob Knight still curses the day he granted the author unfettered access to his program. Feinstein's year as an honorary Hoosier yielded an unsparing portrait of Indiana’s combustible coach.” — Sports Illustrated “One of the best sportswriters alive.” — USA Today John Feinstein was a sports writer and bestselling author of more than forty books, including A Season on the Brink , A Good Walk Spoiled, The Ancient Eight, and Five Banners: Inside the Duke Dynasty. He was a longtime columnist for The Washington Post, Golf Digest, and was a frequent contributor to a variety of radio programs. Chapter 1 On the Brink November 24, 1985....The day was no different from any other that fall. A cold rain had been falling steadily all morning and all afternoon, and the wind cut holes in their faces as they raced from their cars to the warmth of the lobby, and then into the locker room a moment later. This was Sunday. In six days, Indiana would begin its basketball season, and no one connected with the team had any idea what the season would hold. The only thing everyone knew for certain was that no one could live through another season like the last one. Bob Knight knew this better than any of them. The 1984-85 season had been the most painful he had lived through in twenty years as a coach. Nine months after what might have been his most glorious night in coaching, he had suffered through his most ignominious. He had gone from Olympic hero to national buffoon, from being canonized in editorials to being lampooned in cartoons. In the summer of 1984, Knight had coached perhaps the best amateur team in the history of basketball. His U.S. Olympic team had destroyed every opponent it faced on the way to the Olympic gold medal. And yet, because of the Soviet boycott, Knight could not feel, even in his greatest moment, complete satisfaction. He had returned to coach at Indiana and had experienced his worst season. He benched starters, threw his leading rebounder off the team, and generally acted like a man who was burned out -- scorched out might be a better term. Some friends urged him to quit, or at least take a year off. But Knight couldn't quit; he had to prove himself -- again. At age forty-five, Knight was starting over. Not from scratch, but not that far from it. He knew by the end of the previous season that he had to change. He knew he could not lash out at his team every time it failed. He surely knew that he could never again throw a chair during a game as he had done in February during a loss to Purdue. He had to work harder than he had worked in recent years. He had to be certain that he still wanted to coach and act that way. He had to get his team playing the way it had played during his six years at West Point and during his first thirteen years at Indiana. Above all, he had to be more patient. For Knight, the last was the most difficult. Bob Knight was many things: brilliant, driven, compassionate -- but not patient. His explosions at players and officials on the bench during games were legendary. To those who knew him, his eruptions in practice and the locker room were frightening. Friends worried after he threw the chair that he was destined to end up like Woody Hayes, the Ohio State football coach whose career had ended when he slugged an opposing player in frustration at the end of a bowl game. Knight had come to practice on October 15, eager to begin again. Players and assistant coaches noticed right away that he was teaching more, that he spent less time talking to buddies on the sidelines and more time caught up in the work. He was more patient. He seemed