Sunday, November 21, 1999
COLLEGE BASKETBALL INSIDER
SI all-century team needs second look
BY MIKE DeCOURCY
The Cincinnati Enquirer
The first thing that came to mind upon glancing at the pages of Sports Illustrated on which the magazine revealed its all-century college basketball team was this: No point guard?
How can SI pick a team of college basketball's best without naming a guy at the most important position in the game?
The second thing that came to mind was that the selection of Oscar Robertson addressed the first thing.
Robertson, the Cincinnati Bearcats' greatest player, could play any position except center well enough to make this team.
But that does not address all the problems with SI's selections. All of the players competed between 1957 and 1975. That cuts out a lot of excellent basketball and ignores the progress made in the past 25 years.
Robertson and center Lew Alcindor of UCLA (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar) are automatic. The rest of SI's selections are debatable.
• Shooting guard: SI's choice: David Thompson, N.C. State (26.8 ppg, 8.1 rpg, .553 FG).
Other choices: Jerry West, West Virginia (24.8, 13.3, .508); Steve Alford, Indiana (19.5, 2.8, .533); Michael Jordan, North Carolina (17.7, 5.0, .540); Pete Maravich (44.2, 6.4, .438); Austin Carr, Notre Dame (34.6, 7.3, .528); Hank Luisetti, Stanford (16.1 ppg).
The proper pick: Robertson, which would have left the point guard position free for North Carolina's Phil Ford.
• Small forward: SI's choice: Bill Bradley, Princeton (30.2 ppg, 12.1 rpg, .513 FG).
Other choices: Mark Aguirre, DePaul (24.5, 7.9, .546); Elgin Baylor, Seattle (31.3, 20.0, .502); Sean Elliott, Arizona (19.2, 6.1, .512); Danny Manning, Kansas (20.1, 8.1, .593); Chris Mullin, St. John's (19.5, 4.1, .550).
Proper choice: Larry Bird, Indiana State (30.3, 13.3, .533). He dominated the game in the late 1970s — when more athletes and more schools emphasized basketball — the way great players commonly did two decades before.
• Power forward: SI's choice: Jerry Lucas, Ohio State (24.3 ppg, 17.2 rpg, .624 FG)
Other choices: Elvin Hayes, Houston (31.0, 17.2, .536); Dan Issel, Kentucky (25.8, 13.0, .519); Clyde Lovellette, Kansas (24.5, 10.2, .452); Wayman Tisdale, Oklahoma (25.2, 10.1, .578); Hank Gathers, Loyola Marymount (23.3, 9.6, .585); Cliff Hagan, Kentucky (19.2, 13.4, .425).
Proper choice: Christian Laettner, Duke (16.6, 7.8, .574). The greatest player in NCAA Tournament history — Laettner hold records for points and games played — deserves a spot.
HOME WARRIORS: If it seems unremarkable that Indiana traveled to Lubbock, Tex., to open the season against Texas Tech, it wasn't. It was nearly historic.
In the previous three seasons, IU played only five games outside the Big Ten on opposing teams' courts.
One reason IU has had consecutive 20-win seasons while failing to reach the NCAA Sweet 16 the past three seasons? On average, 15 of those wins have come at home, either in Bloomington or Indianapolis. The Hoosiers are 21-25 away from home during that period.
By comparison, Big Ten rival Michigan (with only one NCAA appearance in that stretch) was 30-27, and UC was 34-17 away from the Shoemaker Center in those three seasons.
BLUES FOR CAL? It might come as a surprise if Memphis were to hire John Calipari as its next coach, if only because the school has previously shown an inability or unwillingness to pay the kind of money he would command.
Before Tic Price resigned last week after the university investigated allegations that he'd had an affair with a student, he had a package worth $400,000. Memphis will have to double that to get in the chase for Calipari.
ONE RUBEN TO GO: Arizona had planned to rotate sophomore Ruben Douglas and freshman Gilbert Arenas at shooting guard this season, but something happened to foul up those plans.
Arenas was beating out Douglas, who started 14 games last season, during preseason practice. So Douglas decided to transfer (possibly to New Mexico) and enroll for the spring term. That means he'll have 21/2 years of eligibility starting next December.
“With any of our players, they come here of their own volition,” coach Lute Olson said. “If they feel they can do better somewhere else, it's never a case of where we try to talk somebody out of something.”
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