Coach D? Not yet. Not to anyone but his Pitt players, anyway. But Jamie Dixon is on his way, a lot quicker than a lot of people probably realize.

This seems like the right time to examine Dixon's remarkable accomplishments at Pitt the past four-plus years. The No. 11 Panthers play No. 6 Duke tomorrow night at Madison Square Garden in an intriguing matchup of unbeaten teams. The Duke coach certainly will get enough attention during the ESPN broadcast.

Coach K.

That's all anyone knows Mike Krzyzewski as. Sure, Coach K is a lot easier to say and spell. But he's also nationally known because he's college basketball's second-greatest coach after UCLA's John Wooden, although they might argue that point in Chapel Hill, N.C.; Lexington, Ky.; and maybe even Bloomington, Ind.

Coach D -- should he ever get there -- won't trump Coach K's accomplishments. It's hard to imagine any coach matching Krzyzewski in this era of parity. A total of 785 wins. Three national championships. Ten Final Four appearances, including five in a row from 1988-92. A record 68 NCAA tournament wins.

But it's worth noting Dixon's first four seasons at Pitt were better than Coach K's first four at Duke. It's more important to mention that Dixon's work the past four-plus seasons is very comparable to Krzyzewski's during a time when Coach K is considered college basketball's genius and his program the benchmark of the sport.

Dixon's overall record is 115-30 for a .793 winning percentage. Krzyzewski's record during that period is 122-27, .819. Dixon is 45-19 in Big East Conference regular-season games, Krzyzewski 46-18 in Atlantic Coast Conference games. Each took his teams to the NCAA tournament all four years, although Coach K has a big edge over Dixon there. Duke went 8-4 in the past four tournaments and made it to the Final Four in '04, Pitt 4-4.

The point is this: Duke won't have the huge coaching advantage tomorrow night that some might think.

"I'm proud that we're right there with Duke in a lot of different areas," Dixon said.

Dixon and Krzyzewski are acquaintances but aren't close. Dixon doesn't remember all their conversations, but he does remember calling Coach K when his late sister, Maggie, applied to be the women's coach at Army, where Krzyzewski played and coached before taking over at Duke in 1980. Maggie Dixon accepted the job before Coach K got back to him.

Asked to name the college coach he most admires, Dixon said Lute Olson, who is taking this season off at Arizona for personal reasons. Dixon learned plenty from his Pitt predecessor and boss, Ben Howland, but said he considers him more of a friend than a mentor.

"I probably have studied football coaches as much as basketball coaches," Dixon said. He has read books by Bill Belichick and Tony Dungy. He also considers former Steelers coach Bill Cowher a friend.

"I admire people who do things the right way and win consistently," Dixon said.

Include Dixon in that group.

"I guess I'm most proud of how the program has been passed from player to player," he said. "I believe you can win anywhere for a year or two. But it's a lot harder to sustain it over a period of time."

Pitt lost three pretty good players -- Aaron Gray, Levon Kendall and Antonio Graves -- from last season's team. Gray is with the NBA's Chicago Bulls, Kendall is playing in Greece and Graves is with the CBA's Xplosion. Dixon merely plugged in Dejuan Blair, Sam Young and Ronald Ramon and the Panthers haven't missed a beat. They're off to a 10-0 start and seem capable of playing with Duke tomorrow night.

What's most amazing about Dixon's success is he has won consistently without blue-chip recruits. Even Blair, a freshman who has dominated the non-conference games, wasn't a Top 25 player, although Dixon said that's mostly because Blair didn't play in the top summer tournaments. Still, Blair is likely to spend four years at Pitt instead of leaving early for the NBA; he's only 6 feet 7. Dixon hasn't been able to get the type of player who's so good that he stays only for a year or two.

"I'd love to have the McDonald's All-Americans who can play," Dixon said. "But that doesn't necessarily mean they're going to fit in or be good students. If we have that, I'm all for it. If not, we can be successful anyway."

Word is spreading slowly. It still amazes Dixon, to some degree, that the ESPN broadcasters now refer to "perennial Big East power Pitt." "I like it," he said, grinning.

Once, not long ago, an NCAA tournament appearance was a special bonus for Pitt. Now, under Dixon, it's expected. Pitt has made six consecutive tournaments, including the first two when Dixon was Howland's top assistant.

But ...

You knew there was going to be a but here.

"It's never going to be good enough," Dixon said. "I don't fault that thinking. I have that same feeling."

Pitt failed to get past the Round of 16 in each of those six tournaments. It would be inaccurate to say that makes Dixon defensive, but he did point out, "A lot of other guys didn't get there in the first try, either."

Krzyzewski didn't get Duke to the NCAA tournament until his third season and didn't get it past the second round until his sixth. A couple of Hall of Fame coaches from the Big East -- Jim Calhoun and Jim Boeheim -- also had their struggles. Calhoun didn't get Connecticut into the tournament until his fourth season and didn't get it beyond the Final Eight until his 13th. Boeheim didn't get Syracuse past the Round of 16 until his 11th season.

Dixon is 5-2 against Boeheim and 3-4 against Calhoun, by the way.

"I don't think there's any question we can win a national championship here," Dixon said. "We've proved that just by being in the mix every year. We've just got to keep doing what we're doing and get better in some areas."

Who knows?

Maybe Dixon won't ever become Coach D.

But it's going to be a lot of fun watching him try.

"I'm proud that we're right there with Duke in a lot of different areas."

-- Jamie Dixon