Sports

Coach K helping kids learn joy of reading

The guest speakers at Incarnation School in Washington Heights on Thursday were Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski, who has won four NCAA Tournaments and two Olympic gold medals, and Jim Nantz, the golden-throated announcer with two Emmys, who that night was honored with the National Association of Basketball Coaches Court of Honor Gala Award.

But it was a seventh grader, one who dreams of being an artist, who uttered the words Coach K, Nantz and every student and administrator in attendance will remember forever.

Krzyzewski, a longtime proponent of the NABC’s Ticket to Reading program, asked the 50-odd students assembled in the sweltering gym what they feel when reading.

Kenneth Acosta rose from his seat and in a strong, sincere voice said, “When I read a book it feels like the whole world stops.’’

The world paused for a second, right then. Has there ever been a more thoughtful, evocative description of reading?

Later, when Krzyzewski and Nantz boarded a bus for the drive back to their midtown Manhattan hotel, Coach K said, “I stopped, Jim knew, too, that will be the best thing said today.’’

It was. But there were a lot of good things said in that antiquated gym and there are a lot of good things taking place at Incarnation, a private Catholic school whose enrollment is 97 percent Spanish speaking, mostly from the Dominican Republic and many of the families struggling to make ends meet.

Back in 1950s, ’60s and ’70s, Incarnation served a neighborhood of working class Irish, Italians, German Jews and Greeks, a neighborhood much like the one in which Krzyzewski was raised in Chicago.

Krzyzewski also attended Catholic school, where his dream of becoming a high school basketball coach and teacher took root. So the man who commands $100,000 per speaking engagement was there, gratis, because coming to this school and interacting with these students feels like coming home.

“We went to New Jersey one year and that was cool, but this is more like how I grew up, St. Helen’s school,’’ Krzyzewski said. “The only thing is there weren’t nuns [here]. What you could see on their faces, like their librarian, Pat [Cronin], … is how committed they were to making you better.

“Sometimes we forget that this is the real world. We’re in a little bit of a privileged world.’’

Krzyzewski has built Duke’s program into the most privileged of the privileged. He recruits the best players. The Blue Devils fly charter and stay in top-of-the-line hotels.

It wasn’t always this way. When he took over Duke in 1980, the Blue Devils were a bottom-tier ACC team. They won 13 league games in his first three seasons.

But driven by the values he learned at home, at St. Helen’s and at the United States Military Academy, Krzyzewski would not accept failure. That’s what happens for students at Incarnation.

The world around many of these students may be spinning madly, but on West 175th Street, it slows down. And when students such as Kenneth Acosta learn a love of reading, the world peacefully stops.

Pat Cronin, formerly the school’s librarian and now its fund-raiser, was looking for ways to help the students at Incarnation when she came across the Ticket to Reading program on the Internet four years ago. She applied, and not only was Incarnation welcomed into the program, but also has become a shining example of what Ticket to Reading can be.

A child who reads five books gets a backpack. Twenty-five books gets a student a sports watch. And when the students at Incarnation thrive, they get their second visit in four years from Coach K.

“You see the expressions on all these kids and see it working and it feels pretty good,’’ he said.

We saw a side of Krzyzewski not often seen. On the sidelines he fluctuates from laser-beam focus to impassioned coach to relentless competitor. Thursday he was a teacher. He told these students his dream began in a school just like theirs, at just their age.

Nantz asked the students their goals in life. There were some predictable responses from some of the boys: NBA or NFL stardom. But there were others who dream of becoming a lawyer or in Acosta’s case, an artist.

These dreams cost money and there is short supply of it in this neighborhood. Tuition is $3,300 annually and 75-80 percent of the student body receives financial aid.

The next Mike Krzyzewski — or the next Jackson Pollock — might be enrolled at Incarnation right now. The world won’t stop if the school ever closes, but it surely won’t be a better place.

* Those wishing to contribute to Incarnation School can do so by visiting the school’s website at http://www.incarnationnyc.org. There will be more about Coach K, who gave The Post an exclusive interview, in Monday’s Post.