Some breaking news just now
learning of the death of
basketball legend Denny Crum.
He was 86, our Doug Profit.
Taking a look back at his life,
Denny Crum has been known to walk
straight from the basketball court
right to a local charity event.
Coach Crum Hill, he puts
his arm around everybody.
Had his picture made with everyone.
Denny Crumb signing autographs,
auctioning off items. Without
Coach Crumb, we would not have
raised the money that we raised.
I know that. I feel certain of that.
And just where are these 300 invited
guests he's never met there at
Crumbs Own House in Jefferson County.
He shows people through his house.
Just built a new theater on his house
and he takes people through that and.
Very. He invites them to come back every
summer. Crum hosts this picnic at his place,
$80,000 last year, and that brought
us the 4th of the nation of the 200
universities to take part in in.
In coach versus catch, it's
a thank you on behalf of
coaches versus cancer.
A specific fundraiser through
the American Cancer Society that
Crumb has helped raised a half
million dollars for over 6 years.
Well, he knows that's one of the
things that'll attract people
to give this more money. I
don't know a single time that he
ever said no to Denny's a head
coach and I'm one of the assistants.
The former UFL athletic director Bill
Olson says Crumbs insistence on helping
Louisville charities still amazes him.
I. Thought that he would eventually burn out.
I saw him do this 30 some years ago
and he's doing it today, just like
he did when he first came here. And
Olson tells the story of a bedridden
woman in the same nursing home as
his own mother who was a U of L fan.
Her room was decorated,
her wall the doors with all U of L
things that Danny had brought to her.
And I went out when I found this
out and the nurses told me that
he came at least once a month,
sometimes more often than that,
to visit her and.
And that's way that I've heard those
kind of stories that he's done
that so often for other people,
visits the children on his own and
when we call, doesn't hesitate.
He's over in a flash. At
Coaster Children's Hospital,
they say Crum delivers food and
gifts to staff people and delights
children with visits with increasing
frequency around the holidays.
He comes in on his own.
We won't even know about it.
He just takes the time to
come over because he cares.
I can call coach just about anytime.
And if he's not there, I'll leave a
message and he'll get right back with me.
In 1997, the coach would
mark his six hundredth win,
but with questions surrounding the
state of the program at the time,
he was starting to get
asked about his future.
Yeah, I still like what I'm doing.
I really enjoy coaching.
I enjoy working with young people and and.
I just think at this stage of my life,
I'm not really concerned or interested
in anything long term. Anyway,
Four years later, in 74 more wins,
the coach chose his 64th birthday,
March 2nd, 2001 to announce his
retirement from the daily grind.
Denny Crum retired was $7,000,000
to be paid by U of L / 15 years,
a $2,000,000 severance agreement.
At a sixfigure assistant for development
consultant job where he reported
directly to the president of U of L
It's my wish that that I retire from
this university when I do retire,
whenever that happens and hopefully
it'll be a ways down the road I've got.
But it was a forced retirement
and the way it was handled put
a wedge between the famed coach
and the athletic department under
athletic director Tom Jurich.
I asked you, Rich, in 2017,
his first ever public comments on
his poor relationship with Crum,
if you regretted handling
things the way he did.
The biggest fight on change you had,
what was it? Which one was it, do you think?
Probably Coach Crum, you know,
I think everybody recognized
it was time to do it.
It's just nobody want to do it, you know.
And that's a credit to him.
And that's why I'll never
take anything away from him.
You brought him up several times.
Do you think you handled that one badly?
No, no, I don't.
I don't think there's any other
way I could have handled it. But
U of L fans eventually heard
about how Crum was being treated,
and they loved him back even more for it.
Why? It simply came down to
his love for this community.
And what I learned is he was
wrapping up his career in 2001
about his efforts to give back.
In retirement, Crum showed up at
charity golf tournaments more often.
And continued to be on a roll of warmth
and caring for the city and the school,
even though he may have harbored
bitterness toward how he was treated.
The former athletic director
Bill Olsen described any crumbs.
30 years of touching lives this way.
It's
not hundreds. It's thousands.
It's probably over 30 years.
It may be hundreds of thousands of people
that he's taken time to do that with.
And he was doing it long
before other coaches.
Denny Crum, you can say,
was a Hall of Famer.
When it comes to showing
it's more than a game.
We feel an obligation to do the best
we can and make this community a
better place to live and raise kids.
And that's what we're trying to do,
just help make it a better place.
He was 86 more in the life of Denny
Crum coming up tonight at 4-5 and six.