By Menachem Wecker
John Kuester eagerly anticipates his new job coaching the Detroit Pistons, which he says promises to be a high-energy and exciting team next season, but the former professional basketball player also remembers fondly his five-year tenure as GW Colonials head coach.
“My best memories from GW are having had the opportunity to work with a lot of young players that I still have good relationships with,” says Mr. Kuester, who coached men’s basketball at GW from 1985 to 1990. “The second best would be the relationship that I formed with Red Auerbach. It was one of the most special times of my life.”
The late NBA Hall of Fame coach Arnold Jacob “Red” Auerbach, who won 16 basketball championships as Boston Celtics head coach, general manager and team president, earned associate, bachelor’s and master’s degrees from GW and was awarded an honorary doctorate of public service in 1993.
With Mr. Kuester’s current responsibilities in Detroit, where he arrived after 14 years as assistant coach of seven NBA teams, he does not have the time to follow GW sports as much as he would like. “But I wish Karl Hobbs and the GW basketball team nothing but the best,” he says. “He is a good man and a good coach.”
After serving as a volunteer assistant at the University of Richmond and as an assistant coach at Boston University in the early 1980s, Mr. Kuester became the youngest head coach in Division I history when he succeeded Rick Pitino as Boston University head coach.
“It meant a great deal to me that I was entrusted with the basketball programs at GW and BU as a young basketball coach,” Mr. Kuester says. “I learned a lot from those experiences and always tried to get the best out of student-athletes both athletically and academically.”
The aspect of college basketball that Mr. Kuester will miss the most is the ability to “touch young people and mold them into not only good basketball players but good people as well.” Even though Mr. Kuester had a losing record at GW, he sees his time with the Colonials as a valuable learning experience.
“When experiences don’t work out, you ask yourself what you can draw from them,” he says. “What I drew from GW is that if you continue to work hard and try to learn, good things will end up happening. Those experiences at GW played a role in getting me here to Detroit as the head coach.”