OAKLAND, Calif. — The Golden State Warriors run a practice drill that Coach Steve Kerr did not intend as a tribute, even if he named it after someone who taught him a great deal. He calls it the “Lute Olson drill,” and it is a blur of activity: a 3-on-2 exercise that Kerr uses to get his players up and down the court.

“It’s a good way to get a little running and rhythm and shooting,” he said.

The Warriors, who are pretty good at those things, have elevated basketball into modern art in recent seasons. But Kerr, as he helps define basketball’s present, cannot help but dip into his past. He learned that drill in 1983, when he was a freshman guard at the University of Arizona playing for Olson, who was in the early stages of building a college powerhouse. Kerr, ever the student, was already absorbing as much as he could.

Olson, 84, retired as the men’s basketball coach at Arizona in 2008, but his influence resonates. Not so much, oddly enough, at the college level, where, of late, Arizona has had its well-publicized struggles along with the rest of the Pac-12 Conference. Instead, Olson’s impact exists largely in the N.B.A. — and with the Warriors, in particular.

Bruce Fraser, one of Kerr’s longtime assistants, played for Olson in the 1980s before working under him as a graduate assistant. And Andre Iguodala, the veteran Warriors forward, played at Arizona from 2002 to 2004, when he sought to emulate an older teammate named Luke Walton.