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Wednesday, March 21, 2007
Pitt, UCLA coaches insist friendship won’t get in way
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Terence Moore
San Jose, Calif. — No question, UCLA’s Ben Howland and Pittsburgh’s Jamie Dixon are terrific college basketball coaches, but they also are terrible liars.
Forgive them, though. They are doing the right thing. If they really told the truth on Wednesday at the HP Pavilion about how difficult it will be for best friends during much of the past 25 years to spend tonight attempting to reach the Elite Eight by slaying the other, they wouldn’t be able to function properly.
Neither would their players.
Come to think of it, Ben Howland and Jamie Dixon were named Tony Dungy and Lovie Smith before, during and after the Super Bowl last month. Just as Dungy of the Indianapolis Colts and Smith of the Chicago Bears evolved into Dr. Phil by fibbing that their close relationship wouldn’t bring extra tension to their lives while battling each other during a huge game, Howland and Dixon have taken the same approach.
Surely Dungy and Smith provided the blueprint forever on how you should handle these situations. Right? Dixon squinted after hearing my question outside of Pitt’s locker room, then said, “You know, the Super Bowl falls during basketball season, so I don’t have time to watch things too much and get a feel on stories.”
See what I mean about the whoppers from these guys? Dixon and Dungy even share the same attorney. Still, Dixon said he wasn’t familiar with the biggest story line of this year’s Super Bowl not involving that historical thing involving African-American coaches. “I know [Dungy and Smith] worked together in the past, but I didn’t know their relationship was that deep, and it’s because I’m so single-minded in December, January and February,” said Dixon, 41, chuckling, trying to sound convincing but failing.
The same went for the suddenly forgetful Howland, and he is a long ways from senility at 48. Even though he spent four splendid years through 2003 resurrecting Pitt basketball from the dead before leaving for UCLA, he kept giving the impression that his savior days in hoops around western Pennsylvania were light years ago. That is, if those days ever occurred. “Really only one player on the team I coached, and that was Levon Kendall, who was a redshirt freshman my last year,” said Howland, who didn’t tell the rest of the story.
For one, Pitt hadn’t managed a winning season during the three years prior to Howland’s arrival, and his Panthers eventually reached the Sweet 16 twice. For another, Pitt is where Howland and Dixon strengthened their already-thick bond. As was the case at Northern Arizona, where Howland had a five-year run of goodness before leaving for Pitt, Dixon was Howland’s top assistant. They also were assistants together before that at University of California at Santa Barbara.
It gets deeper. When Howland took the UCLA job, his daughter, Meredith, was so attached to the Dixon family that she left Los Angeles to stay with the Dixons while attending Pitt. She later became a cheerleader for the Panthers. Now, at 22, and continuing at Pitt these days as a graduate student in nursing, Meredith is the Dixons’ primary babysitter.
If that isn’t enough, Howland was a pallbearer last year after Dixon’s 28-year-old sister died suddenly. Howland and Dixon also talk every day.
“Well, I wouldn’t say every day, but we talk to each other a few times a week during the course of a year,” said Howland, shrugging in the UCLA locker room. He kept hoping that this line of questioning would end in a hurry.
When it didn’t, Howland forced a nervous smile, before adding, “You know, college athletics are different. These kids have four years to play college basketball. The point is, it’s about the players. It’s not about Jamie and I, because we’ve been doing this for a long time, and we’ll be doing it a long time more. We hope to be in some more NCAA tournaments, and the main thing is, we’re now in a 16-team tournament. Two very good teams are meeting in a very important game. Nothing more, nothing less.”
Uh, nice try.
Permalink | Comments (7) | Categories: Final Four, Terence Moore
Trading Schaub makes sense
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
When an NFL team trades its backup quarterback, it’s logical to take that as an endorsement of the starter. But what happened Wednesday, when the Falcons closed in on a trade that will send Matt Schaub to Houston for draft picks, isn’t really about Michael Vick. It’s about Matt Schaub.
There is a tendency to elevate backup quarterbacks to savior status, at least until such time as they actually get on the field. Then the savior lines up behind the left guard and every yahoo in section 120 wonders, “So who’s No. 3?”
Schaub was a third-round pick. He started two games in three seasons. He lost both. Somewhere along the way, he morphed into Y.A. Title holding a clipboard.
One day Matt Schaub was a dirt lot. The next day, he was a dirt lot with rumors of a mall, condos and a country club. Guess what? If the Falcons really thought Schaub was prime real estate, they wouldn’t be trading him.
Bobby Petrino has held the coaching job for two months. I’m not certain, but I’m guessing all except 12 minutes for bathroom breaks has been spent on player analysis and watching game tape. If Petrino looked at Schaub and concluded, in so many words, “Wow!”, he would not be gift-wrapping the Falcons’ next starting quarterback for the Texans.
It doesn’t mean Schaub is destined for doom (although you certainly wonder about the personnel decisions of a franchise that passed on Reggie Bush and Vince Young, and only last season extended the contract of David Carr, who’s now available for a nickel). It doesn’t mean Schaub won’t develop into a solid NFL starter. But it does mean that Petrino didn’t view Schaub as the right fit — not for this offense, not for this team, not now, maybe not ever.
Petrino relishes the opportunity to see Vick in his offense. That said, he can’t be certain Vick’s the answer. He only suspects Schaub isn’t. Trading Schaub is the right decision for several reasons. But let’s start with this one: No quarterback controversy.
With Schaub on the depth chart, the debate would’ve started in training camp. It would have been a distraction with all of the usual elements of a quarterback controversy, only with the addition of race and the wattage of anything involving Vick.
Remember when Vick took over for Chris Chandler and the racial divide in the stands, including Chandler’s wife? This would’ve been worse, if only because Vick has become such a lightning rod and has been as much news off the field as on it. Taking his immense talent and potential out of the equation, he has been central to too many soap operas. Even after six seasons, there remain questions about his maturity and his ability to lead a team.
The Falcons have unraveled the last two seasons. Maybe that wasn’t all Vick’s fault. But he hardly stopped the bleeding, either.
Trading Schaub should be a calming element for Vick. The move says, “OK, this is your team. Let’s see what you’ve got.” If he messes up, Petrino’s not going to the bullpen. At least, not this season.
Mind you, this means nothing for Vick’s future beyond 2007. Salary cap issues were going to keep him on the roster through this season. Whether his Falcons tenure extends beyond 16 more games is up to him.
It’s no secret the Falcons have personnel deficiencies. Their offensive line is undersized. Their pass rush just lost Patrick Kerney and returns an injury-plagued John Abraham. There are holes on both sides of the ball. Too many recent draft picks have yet to pan out (notably Roddy White and Jimmy Williams).
Trading Schaub doesn’t fix the problems, but it certainly creates opportunity. The deal enables the Falcons to swap first-rounders with Houston, effectively moving them up two spots to eighth overall. Two more second-round picks (this year and next) will come to Atlanta — which is good in theory, anyway. Also, Schaub’s salary tender ($2.3 million) comes off the books.
This doesn’t make the Falcons a Super Bowl team. But wherever they’re going, the message is clear: Schaub wasn’t going to take them there.
Permalink | Comments (99) | Categories: Falcons / NFL, Jeff Schultz
UCLA still the gold standard
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
I was riding on the shuttle from the Chicago Hyatt Regency to the United Center last Sunday, and I got to talking with Larry Farmer, who played at UCLA when UCLA was the only school worth playing for. He later coached the Bruins — after Larry Brown, before Walt Hazzard — and Loyola (Ill.), and over the weekend he was doing NCAA commentary for Westwood One radio.
Some people love collecting stamps. I love hearing about UCLA’s glory run (10 championships in 12 seasons, in case you’ve forgotten) because I saw it only from afar (via sporadic TV broadcasts from my old Kentucky home, sporadic because college basketball was then considered a regional sport). Farmer and I spoke for 20 minutes. I only wish it’d been 20 hours. Here were some of the things he said:
That Jerry Tarkanian, who went on to greater fame at UNLV, still blames Farmer for costing Long Beach State the 1971 NCAA title. Tark’s 49ers, headed by All-American guard Ed Ratleff, led UCLA by 11 points in the West Regional final, but the Bruins rallied and Farmer blocked a backdoor layup that Tark still regards as the game’s pivotal play.
March Madness in Atlanta:
Check out the AJC’s Final Four pageThat, having blocked the backdoor layup and taken the rebound, he (Farmer) couldn’t wait to pass to Sidney Wicks, the Bruins’ All-American forward. Farmer was just a sophomore sub then and, he said, “I didn’t want any part of the ball.” Wicks made the free throws that gave UCLA one of only two narrow escapes — the other was against Drake in the 1969 Final Four — in its march to seven consecutive titles.
That UCLA and Southern Cal used to fly to Pac-8 away games on the same plane, but that the Bruins would sit in first class while the poor Trojans landed in coach.
That he (Farmer) learned his trade by practicing against the greatest set of forwards (Wicks and Curtis Rowe) in college history on a daily basis.
That Bill Walton, whom Farmer played alongside as a junior and senior, was the greatest fundamental player he had (or has) ever seen.
That he (Farmer) still holds the best winning percentage of any collegian ever. “I was 89-1,” he said. “Kareem [Abdul-Jabbar] was 88-2.”
That the one loss Farmer suffered still rankles. It came against Notre Dame in South Bend in 1971. Austin Carr scored 46 points against a series of Bruin defenders. I asked Farmer if he’d been one of them. “I was about the only one who didn’t get to try,” he said.
As noted, I grew up in Kentucky, so I know all about UK and Louisville. And I’ve seen North Carolina and Duke and UConn win multiple championships, and I’ve been to Allen Fieldhouse in Lawrence and to the Izzone in East Lansing and to Assembly Hall in Bloomington. For all that, the first school that comes to mind when I think of college basketball is the one that won all the time when I was learning to love the game.
When I see those blue-and-gold uniforms, I don’t just see Arron Afflalo and Darren Collison; I see Walton and Kareem and Wicks and Rowe and John Wooden and those 10 astonishing championships in 12 years. To me, UCLA was and always will be the standard of excellence. And when I hear someone like Farmer talk about how it was to have been part of such a thing, I feel like a wide-eyed kid again.
Permalink | Comments (8) | Categories: Final Four, Mark Bradley, Quick Hit
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