Donovan, Pitino cut from the same cloth

A few years ago, Rick Pitino was invited to a surprise birthday party for his protege, University of Florida basketball coach Billy Donovan.

Billy is a Kid no longer. He's turning 40.

"As I read that invitation, I realized that time had really passed," said Pitino, the University of Louisville coach. "It seems like 1987 when Providence College made the Final Four was just yesterday, but it's not."

Time usually stands still when Pitino and Donovan get together. Their basketball careers and lives are unmistakably intertwined. Even on separate paths, the link has never been broken.

So it was fitting that Pitino and Donovan were honored together on Friday night as special guests during the fourth annual Dick Vitale Gala to benefit the V Foundation for Cancer Research, which celebrated the spirit of the late N.C. State coach Jim Valvano and an idealistic quest that followed him to the grave.

The event drew a star-studded cast - college basketball coaching luminaries such as Kentucky's John Calipari, Villanova's Jay Wright, Michigan State's Tom Izzo and Pittsburgh's Jamie Dixon, along with Bucs coach Raheem Morris, Bucs executive Doug Williams, Lightning coach Rick Tocchet and Lightning star Vinny Lecavalier - and 750 people to the Ritz-Carlton Hotel.

It raised more than $1 million. Proceeds will fund research for lung cancer at the H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center in Tampa and pediatric cancer research at All Children's Hospital in St. Petersburg.

Vitale, the ESPN announcer, said he was grateful that all celebrities donated their time, paid all expenses and generally contributed donations to help the cause.

This cause is personal.

Pitino's mother and father died of cancer. Donovan said the best friend of his wife, Christine, recently died after a bout with brain cancer. A 12-year-old boy, close to the UF program, also died of cancer.

"Tonight is about the battle against this vicious, vicious disease," said Vitale, a passionate supporter of the V Foundation, which was founded after cancer claimed Valvano in 1993. "We honor Rick Pitino and Billy Donovan, but we are really just honored to have them here. They are so generous and giving. They are cut from the same cloth."

That's an understatement.

Pitino initially tried to run off Donovan from Providence College, saying the player was 30 pounds overweight and unable to compete at the Big East Conference level. Donovan, though, lost the weight and improved with a work ethic unlike anything Pitino had witnessed (then or since).

In 1987, Pitino's Providence Friars made the Final Four behind Donovan's leadership and long-range shooting. Donovan later played in the NBA for Pitino's New York Knicks, then served as his assistant at Kentucky.

When the Gators first courted Donovan to coach UF's sagging program in 1996, he accepted the job only after Pitino gave his blessing.

And in 2006, when the Gators won the first of back-to-back NCAA titles, Donovan sought out his mentor for a long embrace on the court at Indianapolis. Pitino still says Donovan's championship was more thrilling than his own NCAA title (Kentucky, 1996).

"Without Coach Pitino, I'm not sitting up here and none of this happens," Donovan said.

Fittingly, the Pitino-Donovan circle-of-life connection has continued.

Donovan recently hired a new assistant coach - Richard Pitino, 26, who worked on the Louisville staff for the past two seasons. The young Pitino is said to be a driven, relentless recruiter and a head coach-in-waiting.

Sounds like his father.

Or Donovan.

"He would not have left Louisville for anybody other than Billy Donovan," Pitino said. "It was the toughest conversation I've ever had with any coach - the one I had with my son. I told him, 'You've done an unbelievable job for me. I think you're one of the best young recruiters in the game.'

"I said, 'You have the same first name and the same last name as me, but you have an opportunity to work under someone I love, someone who is going to teach you an awful lot. And you can do your own thing, make your own name.'"

Donovan said hiring the young Pitino was a no-brainer.

"I've been around Richard my whole life," Donovan said. "I obviously have great trust and respect in Coach Pitino. Coach said, 'I think it's time he moved away from me now and I think he'll do terrific.' I think Richard, as a recruiter, even surpassed coach's expectations. He has a tremendously bright future."

To learn more about the V Foundation for Cancer