Never If, Only When
Coach’s Oldest Begotten Son, Pat, brought back memories of Dad when he blew a cork in Texas Tech’s loss to Nebraska. Pat roared oncourt in a fury, drew two technical fouls, and was escorted from the floor. A few minutes later, he came clawing back into the arena to continue his rant and was again forcibly removed. The Big 12 Conference officially reprimanded Patrick a couple days later. A couple of weeks later after a loss to Texas, Patrick lashed out at the officiating during a post-game press conference--telling reporters he, by golly, didn’t care what the league thought of it, either—and the Big 12 suspended him for one game. Pat seems well settled into the same groove his dad laid down; it’s never a question of if there’ll be more unpleasantness, only when. (January 31, 2009)
Jordan Hulls (2008, Bloomington South), Eric Gordon (2007, Indianapolis North Central), A. J. Ratliff (2004, Indianapolis North Central), Jared Jeffries (2000, Bloomington North), Tom Coverdale (1998, Noblesville), Luke Recker (1997, DeKalb), Damon Bailey (1990, Bedford North Lawrence), Pat Graham (1989, Floyd Central), Jay Edwards and Lyndon Jones (1987, Marion), Delray Brooks (1984, Michigan City), Steve Alford (1983, New Castle), Steve Bouchie (1979, Washington), Ray Tolbert (1977, Anderson Madison Heights), Kent Benson (1973, New Castle), Dave Shepherd (1970, Carmel), George McGinniss (1969, Indianapolis Washington), Tom and Dick Van Arsdale (1961, Indianapolis Manual), Jimmy Rayl (1959, Kokomo), Hallie Bryant (1953, Indianapolis Crispus Attucks), Bob Masters (1948, Lafayette Jeff), Bill Garrett (1947, Shelbyville), Tom Schwartz (1945, Kokomo), Ed Schienbein (1940, Southport)—Mr. Basketball recruits who’ve played (or will, in the case of Hulls) at Indiana University, from a list compiled by the Indianapolis Star’s IU beat writer, Terry Hutchens, posted on the Star’s website April 13, 2009
The Same Goes For Indiana University Football Fans. . .
“Real Cub fans are 99.44% scar tissue.”—George Will, himself a Chicago Cubs fan, writing in his 1998 book, Bunts, a collection of his essays on major league baseball.
Indiana University basketball recruit David Williams is the latest to make the case for federal legislation establishing a National Bureau of Weights, Measures and Statistics for Athletes. The Indianapolis Star’s April 21 edition carried a two-paragraph bulletin describing Williams as a 6-8, 220-pound guard. It said he averaged 21 points, 11 rebounds, and 6 assists per game in the season just completed. Within hours one of the websites dedicated to IU said he was a 6-7, 200-pound forward. The loss of an inch and 20 pounds virtually overnight strongly suggested the potential of some debilitating disease, and concern spread rapidly through anxious IU fan ranks on internet sites and blogs. Then there emerged a conflicting report that the lad’s statistics really should have been 11 points, 7 rebounds, and 2.6 assists. The Star’s IU beat writer contacted Williams’ coach, Charles Showers, who said the lower stats came from a bureau which his school had provided statistics for only a few games, not the whole season. The real statistics, he assured the Star, were the first ones. The Star quoted Showers saying, “He’s 6-7 and still growing. He weighs right at 220. But he’s all of 6-7. Actually, he plays all five positions for us . . . I’d call him a big guard.” He added that Williams has a 3.8 GPA and was an honor society student. Then the local newspaper, The Florida Times-Union, published in Jacksonville, reported the lad’s commitment to Indiana and listed his statistics at 13 points a game, seven rebounds, and five assists, and said Williams was a 6-7 guard. It quoted a rival coach saying that Williams was “the best defensive player I’ve seen . . . in the past several years.” It seems to have occurred to no one—yet—to visit the school, ask to see the 2008-2009 season’s scorebooks, and compile the year’s statistics from those. (April 26, 2009) (Footnote: Williams later either finessed or was finessed out of the IU picture. He did not sign with Indiana in the fall period and has disappeared from IU radar, in what now appears a wonderful stroke of good fortune for both sides.)
Coach In An Unfamiliar Place: 16th
A Sporting News panel of 188 coaches has named the greatest 50 coaches from all sports and retired UCLA Coach John Wooden was No. 1 by a wide margin (a 57-20 first place vote margin over the runnerup, Vince Lombardi of the Green Baby Packers). Ranked No. 3 through 10 were Paul “Bear” Bryant, Phil Jackson, Don Shula, Red Auerbach, Scotty Bowman, Dean Smith, Casey Stengel, and Knute Rockne. The USA Today story on this topic listed no other names. One wondered: where was Bob Knight? Well, SN’s website revealed that Coach was16th, trailing Pat Summitt, Paul Brown, Joe Paterno, George Halas, and Chuck Noll, and ahead of such luminaries as Mike Krzyzewski (19), Adolph Rupp (21), Woody Hayes (27), Pete Newell (31), and Hank Iba (47). (July 30, 2009)
Indiana University has finally done the right thing and decided to induct its former basketball coach, Bob Knight, into the school’s athletic hall of fame, an annual ceremony customarily attended by nearly all the honorees. IU Nation is now abuzz with the cosmic question: Will Coach return for the November 6 ceremony? I have yet to find a single person willing to bet money that He will. Most don’t even expect Him to politely decline, just simply not show up. It hardly matters. IU is in the strategically correct position. The ball is now in Coach’s court, and He can write His own ending to the episode. He will be inducted, present or absent, and the universe will move on. (July 30, 2009)
The University of Louisville (where basketball coach Rick Pitino has the “million percent support” of UL’s poohbahs, despite Rick’s recent Personal Scandal Unpleasantness) has announced plans to build a 22,000-seat, $250 million arena for the basketball program. A short drive east, at the University of Kentucky, resides basketball coach John Calipari, who now has left two former employers (the universities of Massachusetts and Memphis) stained by the NCAA-forced forfeiture of Final Four appearances. And in Bloomington, still too freshly tarred and feathered by its Kelvin Sampson Unpleasantness, the idea of a new basketball arena seems impossibly distant and unrealistic. (July 31, 2009)
Jim Crews, a former Indiana player under Bob Knight, has been fired as head basketball coach at Army after seven straight losing seasons and a 60-139 record. West Point athletic Director Kevin Anderson issued a peculiar and carefully-worded statement: “There was a series of events that led me down the path to determine that I needed to make a change in leadership . . . I am very disappointed with some things that have come to my attention in recent days.” It’s up to eager reporters now, to dig out the story behind the story. (September 20, 2009)
Coach will serve as the analyst for ESPN’s “Big Monday” television broadcasts of Big 12 Conference games, teaming with veteran broadcaster Brent Musberger. This is another reminder that Coach, who has spent a lifetime insulting and ridiculing journalists, doesn’t mind being one when there’s big money to be made. (October 16, 2009)
An article on Indiana University-related website described freshman basketball recruit Bawa Muniru as being 6 feet 11 inches tall and weighing 242 pounds. The next day, a story in the Indianapolis Star by IU beat writer Terry Hutchens, said Muniru weighed 260 pounds. This is an 18-pound gain overnight. And just in passing, we may note that Muniru’s height (or “length,” as sports pundits are so fond of saying nowadays) has been variously reported at 6-11, 7-0, and 7-1 in the past six months. Where is the National Bureau of Weights and Measures for Sports when we so desperately need it? (November 6, 2009)
The appointed hour came and went and Indiana University inducted, without incident, its former basketball coach, Bob Knight, into its Athletic Hall of Fame. Coach was a no-show. He sent a letter to new athletic director Fred Glass, in which he sprinkled bile amid a few half-hearted compliments, and offered as His main excuse for not attending His belief that His presence and the ensuing media frenzy would have detracted from the attention rightly deserved by the other nominees. He was correct on that point. Bob Hammel, a longtime friend of Knight and a retired Bloomington sports editor, acted as Knight’s stand-in at the ceremonies over the weekend. (November 8, 2009)
Coach made his first appearance of the new basketball season as an ESPN analyst in the annual NCAA Hall of Fame Tipoff Classic. This is a showcase event for the NCAA, which prides itself—incessantly—on its insistence on the highest standards for academics, graduation rates, ethics, strict adherence to its rules. But yet, there on the gloriously shiny hardwood floor, strategically placed for the television cameras and a nationwide audience, was a huge logo for the game’s prime sponsor . . . Budweiser beer!! And there in the booth was Bob Knight, the guy who has spent his adult lifetime ridiculing journalists, but who is not averse to being one when he can earn big bucks doing so. (November 17, 2009)
The Day Nate Thurmond Opted For Life
The Indiana-Kentucky basketball game in early December provided a Kodak Moment wonderfully illustrating the talent and strength mismatch between the two teams. There was a scramble for a loose ball right in front of DeMaArcus Cousins, Kentucky’s strapping (6-10 and 260 or so pounds) freshman center. Indiana’s Verdell Jones, a skinny (6-5 and 186 pounds) guard, had the ball and Cousins bent over, grabbed the ball, and lifted it and Jones off the floor to about waist level. Officials and other players rushed in to prevent any eruption of violence, and there was none. The episode retrieved from my memory a story told years ago in a magazine article by Nate Thurmond, who was a monster center in the NBA in the 1960s and 1970s. The league was then dominated by 7-foot-1-inch Wilt Chamberlain, whose strength was legendary, as was the awfulness of his free-throw shooting. Thurmond told of a game against Chamberlain’s Philadelphia 76ers. Wilt got the ball down low, crouched, and began to spring skyward for a slam dunk. Thurmond was guarding him, and instinctively grabbed Wilt’s forearms to prevent him from getting off the shot. A split second after doing this, Thurmond realized that Chamberlain was soaring toward the rafters with not only the basketball, but with Nate Thurmond, too, and for another split second Thurmond had the fear flash through his mind that Wilt was going to dunk him as well as the basketball. Nate said he let go--and saved his own life. (December 12, 2009)
Oh, That’s Just Coach Being Coach
Knight, wearing a green sweater, had several exchanges with his good friend, former Bloomington Herald-Times sports editor Bob Hammel, who sat next to him near the podium. At one point, Hammel’s cell phone rang, and Knight glared at him. Knight grabbed the phone, and spoke into it: “ I have no idea who this is, but he’s busy right now.”—Terry Hutchens, reporting in the Indianapolis Star on a speech given by former Indiana University basketball Coach Bob Knight at an Indianapolis fund-raising dinner for the Indiana Basketball Hall of Fame attended by over 1,000 people. An account of this episode in Inside Indiana, offered a slightly different choice of words by Knight. A Fort Wayne reporter, Pete DiPrimio, wrote of the crucial moment Knight grabbed Hammel’s phone and began speaking. . .”I have no idea who this is, but the son of a bitch is busy right now.” It ain’t easy, being Coach’s friend. (December 18, 2009)
- Tom Bolyard, Jack Brown (1940s era), Hallie Bryant (1950s), Archie Dees (1950s), Clarence Doninger, Scott Eells, Chuck Franz, Pat Graham, Steve Green, Gary Grieger, Kyle Hornsby, John Kamstra, Ted Kitchel, Mike LaFave, Gary Long (1950s), Bobby Masters, Todd Meier, Jerry Memering, Mike Niles, Pete Obremsky, Wayne Radford, Chris Reynolds, Steve Risley, Bill Russell (1960s), Earl Schneider, Burke Scott (1953-55), Erik Suhr, Ryan Tapak, Don Williamson (1950s), John Wood (1950s).—Former IU basketball players spotted in attendance at a Varsity Club Tip-Off Dinner for the 2008-2009 Hoosier basketball team, held in Assembly Hall October 28, 2008.
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Indiana’s football team ranks last in the Big Ten and third from last of 66 teams in BCS conferences in victories in the past decade ending in 2007. In 63rd position with 35 victories (and 68 losses), IU is ahead of only Vanderbilt (30), Baylor (29), and Duke (14). In the Big Ten, IU’s last-place mark is 35 wins and 68 losses. Illinois is 10th with 42 wins, then Northwestern at 51, Michigan State with 54, Minnesota with 55, Purdue with 61, Penn State with 64, Iowa with 66, Wisconsin with 74, Michigan with 76. In first place is Ohio State with 89 wins and 22 losses.
Stewardship, Updated for Legal Fees
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The Indianapolis Star, acting like a newspaper should, has pried loose more information about Indiana University’s payments to lawyers involved in the truly awful Kelvin Sampson Unpleasantness. The Star had to file a Freedom of Information request to obtain the information. Through July 31, IU has spent $497,646 on legal fees. About $470,000 of this went to the Indianapolis firm of Ice Miller. The rest went to lawyers for Sampson and IU who represented them in a 2006 hearing before the NCAA for NCAA rules violations while Sampson was coach at Oklahoma. This brings the total so far paid (since Bob Knight was fired in September of 2000) for athletic department staff and coach buyouts, and legal fees in the Sampson matter, to $4,950,646. Additional legal fees are expected, the Star reported. (November 21, 2008)