News Scrapbook 1984

~e jan:IDi(!lo ltnton Sunday, March Il, 198' ©

• winners

USD's p ayers know what their roles are

settle us down. He is also a great Jong-range shooter. He does not have great quickness or the skills to penetrate as a point guard, but he can steady us." Reserve guard Al Moseatel - "He is instant offense, especially against the zone. And he's an 'up' guy. He lifts both the offense and the defense. He's always heckling the other team and he'll take the charge. He'll make some- thing happen. He·s not great handling the ball, but he's fantastic on the wing against the zone. "But it just wasn't the seven guys who played most the time,'' continued Brovelli. "Our success runs the length of the bench." An example is reserve center Mario Coronado. The 6-8 sophomore started at the beginning of the sea on but was replaced by Thompson. "The reason Scott has come along so fast is Mario," Brovelli said. "He beats on Scott every day in practice. Mario has also been one of the more vocal players on the bench. If there was an individual who summed up our concern for each other as players, it IS Mario."

Center Scott Thompson, a 6-11 freshman - "He has great hands and can play with his back to the basket. He's a fir,e shot. He's still learning, but he's come a long way. He can improve as a rebounder, but he's learned how to keep the ball alive on the boards. An excellent freshman." Bostic - "Both offensively and defensively, his athletic ability has helped us, especially defensively. He can force turnovers we never got before. Offensively, he's involved from the free-throw line and in, and he can go to the boards. He is not a great outside shooter. In the last month he's understood his role better and it's made the team much more effective." Chris Carr - "All his life he has been a shooting guard. For us he gave up shooting and accepted the role of running the team and getting the ball upcourt. Defensive- ly, he's the same as Mark. He's created turnovers we never got before." Reserve guard John Prunty - " ormally our first re- serve off the bench, he can do two things. He has been with me for four years and knows what I want. He can

USD does have one player who is not limited to a smgle role. Brovelll makes the most of the 6-foot-7 Whitmarsh. He is not restricted to his forward position. In some of- fenses, Whitmarsh is playing pomt guard. In other sets, he IS at the high post. If the Toreros are three points behind, chances are Whitmarsh will make the basket and draw the foul. He leads USD in scoring (18.8 pomts a game average), rebounds (7.2), assists (6.2) and steals. "He is the best all-around player in the conference," Brovelli said. "We really won't know what we have until he 1s gone," which is as soon as the Toreros suffer their 10th loss or wm the NCAA title. Everyone else plays off Whitmarsh. Yesterday, Brovel- h discu ed the strengths and limitations of his role play- ers· Rea - "He does not shoot that well from beyond 15 feet and he doesn't take those shots. His role is hitting the offensive boards and the inside play. He is very quick 1ns1de, a great offensive rebounder. When we get him the ball inside, it's either a basket or a foul."

Barry Lorge M aybe Jim Brovelli will stay as head basketball coach at the University of San Diego after the Toreros' first excursion to the National Collegiate Athletic Association tournament. It is hard to fors:ike a balmy, beautiful city and a program blossoming as brightly as USD's. Or perhaps Brovelli will move to greener pastures and new challenges - most likely to his alma mater, the University of San Francisco, which is reviving the once-proud basketball tradition it abandoned last year amid scandal unbecoming for a Jesuit school. Brovelli would be the ideal professor to restore both virtue and virtuosity to USF's vacant chair of roundball. There are other rumors afoot. One has Stanford coach Tom Davis moving next season to UCLA, and Stanford beckoning Brovelli to his Bay Area roots at another school where brains and brawn coexist amicably An honorable man, Brovelli doesn't want to consider or discuss his future until USD's season is completed. He is living a coach's dream, and he wants to savor every exhilarating moment. Then he will face a tough but pleasant decision: To remain at Alcala Park, where his program is starting to bear the fruit of honest labor. or to accept one of the attractive jobs that undoubtedly will be offered him:- Whatever he decides, Brovelli has created a legacy that will endure at USO. THE TOREROS ARE CHAMPIONS of the West Coast Athletic Conference even though their adm1SSions standards are stringent. Brovelli has demonstrated that academic and athletic excellence are not mutually exclusive, that you can win with a team that doesn't make a mockery of the term "student-athlete." That is no small feat in an era when "big-time" college sports are so riddled with corruption that enlightened folks wonder, as the administration at USF did. whether the games serve any higher purpose than publicity and profits It is refreshing, at a time when some college "stars" can't write well enough to fake their own transcripts, to have a Brovelli remind us what a noble profession coaching can be. He is what, in a more innocent and idealistic time, we assumed all coaches to be - teacher, father confessor, counselor, friend and guiding light to his players, as well as talent scout and strategist. He loves basketball as a game, not a war. He likes it played with discipline and fun. He wants to win, but not at any cost. His art is to blend individuals into a team, in harmony with the rhythm of a bouncing ball. Brovelli is intense, but never a wild man on the bench. He cares about his players as people and students as well as point guards and shooting forwards. He takes more pleasure in molding and motivating athl than in manipulating them. HE LOOKS LIKE AN ACADEMIC in tweedy sports jackets with patches on the elbows, and there is professorial gray in the hair that contrasts with his boyish face. He takes his job seriously, but he has an easy sense of humor. He believes in abiding by the rules, but assumes no pious airs. At USD, the basketball coach is a member of the faculty. I felt as if I knew Brovelli even before we met in 1981 because I used to work with his cousin, Betty Cuniberti, a talented journalist who covered sports for several newspapers before settling on her current job as a feature writer in the Washington bureau of the Los Angeles Times. "Jim is sort of the only man I grew up with," she reminisced yesterday, by phone, as she watched Syracuse and Georgetown battle for the Big East championship on television. "We lived a couple of blocks apart, and he's really the reason I'm a sports fan. I liked to go to his games, and he just always seemed to be the epitome of sportsman. He was quiet, he played bard and well, and he was cute! "When he played for USF, I was in the seventh or eighth grade. I was a very loud fan. I'd wait until the gym was really quiet and then I'd scream out his name. About halfway through the season, he asked his mother - I call her 'my crazy Aunt Elvira' because she's the wild one in the family - to ask me not to yell so much. He was embarrassed ... He was always a real gentleman, kind of a steady guy who just loved what he was doing." Brovelli is still that way, and now he is reaping the rewards of a program be has built for a decade. "IT'S THE MOST SATISFYING SEASON I've ever had,_ and I've been coaching since I was 21, so you're talking 20 years,'' he said yesterday. "It's not only wins and losses, but the group I have here. You preach that given an equal amount of talent, the thing that distinguishes you is the chemistry, the togetherness, the unity, the multiple personalities meshing into one. We have had 15 people playing as one for the past two months, and it has just been an exc::eptional team to coach. They all know their roles, their strengths, their limitations and because they accept them, they have been successful. No matter how long you talk about that, they have to go out and do it." Other coaches might have chafed under an administration that dictated no special favors for athletes in the admissions office, but Brovelli knew the policy when he accepted the USO job and pushed for the program's ele-c,:ation to Division I five years ago. Determination not to compromise high academic standards has made success even sweeter. "Right now we have eight guys on the all-academic team, with 3.0 grade-point averages or above" he said. "Last ' year, we had seven. We win that every year. But talk about satisfaction - to win the conference by two games and go to the NCAAs, knowing that you've got tougher recruiting restrictions than anyone else! It can be done. We proved it. "That is tremendous satisfaction not only to me but to an _administration that can take credit for this type of attitude. They've supported us without beading in any way, shape or form. Maybe it takes longer to get there, but I've never believed in overnight success ~nyway. To build a solid foundation is going to take a little time, but I don't have any problem with that because I think it lasts longer. Some guys who cut corners never _makE: it anyway, so it's better this way." The foundation will be there, whether Brovelli stays or t;lkes his classy act elsewhere.

san Otego, CA lS•n otego Co.) Union (0 . 217,324) (S. 339,788)

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draws Princeton

teams

NCAA Division I Men's Playoffs Op,~

c sen to embark on tourney trail i-J~rom C-1 ifinals of the Atlantic Coast Conference Tournament Sat- urday. Other seeds m the East are Arkansas (25-6) No. 2 Syracuse (22-8) No. 3 and Indiana (20-8) No. 4. DePaul (26-2) is the No. 1seed m the Midwest Regional, giving the retiring 70-year-old Ray Meyer a final shot at the elusive NCAA title. Meyer has coached DePaul for 42 seasons and his 723 victories make him No. 5 in NCAA history but he's only taken the Blue Demons to one Final Four, fmi-hing third in 1979 behind Michigan State, with Earvin Johnson, and Indiana State, with Larry Bird. Houston (28-4) is seeded second with Purdue (21-6) No. 3 and Wake Forest (21-8) No. 4. Behind Kentucky (26-4) in the Mideast is No. 2 Illinois (24-4), No. 3 Maryland (22-7) and No. 4 Tulsa (27-3). Four ACC and three Big Ten teams are listed among the top 16 seeds UTEP was the only Western team seed- ed. Last year 13 of the selection committee's top 16 seeds made it to the regional semifinals. Da e Gavitt, chairman of the selection committee, said the overall strength of this year's tournament can be the best ever. "The No. 1 and No. 2 seeds in each region look awfully, awfully tough," Gavitt said. "They've had some great years and a lot of great victories. The third through the eighth seeds, I won't be surprised at any results of those games. I don't see the tenn 'upset' applying anywhere between the third seeds and the ninth seeds," Gavitt said. The biggest controversy in the selections may center on moving Georgetown, a Washington D.C., school, to the West. The Hoyas, the Big East champions and NCAA runners-up two years ago, were ranked second in the Associated Press poll last week. They could move ahead of North Carolina, which lost to Duke in the ACC tourna- ment Saturday, in this week's rankings. Gavitt said the committee agonized over the decision of whether to keep the Hoyas or the Tar Heels in the East, their natural geographic region. "North Carolina has been No. 1 all year. They have only two defeats. It would have been comm1ttmg over-reaction to seed North Carolina anywhere but in the East." North Carolina was among the six heavyweights who won or shared conference titles but lost in their post- season tournaments. Joining the Tar Heels with back- door entries into the 46th annual tournament were No. 6 Oklahoma of the Big Eight, No. 10 Nevada-Las Vegas of the Pacific Coast Athletic Association, No. 15 Temple of the Atlantic-IO, No. 16 Illinois State of the Missouri Valley and No. 18 Louisville of the Metro. The NCAA showered at-large berths on the ACC, giving bids to Duke, Wake Forest and Virginia (17-11) in addition to North Carolina to round out a five-team contingent that also includes post-season tourney winner Maryland. 'The Southeastern Conference landed three more of the at- large berths - Auburn (20-10), Louisiana State (18-10) and Alabama (18-11) - as did the Big East with Syracuse, St. John's (18-11) and Villanova (18-11). Others receiving at-large berths were No. 8 Arkansas and Southern Methodist (24-7) of the Southwest Confer- ence, Indiana and co-champion No. 11 Purdue of the Big Ten, independent Dayton (18-10) and Virginia Com- monwealth (22-6) of the Sunbelt Conference, No. 17 Ore-

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SenJod Round• ~larch 17 Ir 18

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R,ciom.1,

BYU

8

\IID[AST

1 AIL-Birmrogbam 91

I Kentucky 11

'

5

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Morehead SI.

1

121

1

1

N. Carolioa A~T 1

Tulsa

4 1

6

l.txington, Kt. \larcb 22-24

Oregon St.

1

Wnl Virginia 11

I Mar)laad 31

7

Villaao,·a

1

10

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Stan!<, IIL \tare• 31

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S',IU 9 1-I---~ ---- Georgetown 1 I v:L\' 5

Princeton t:SD

12 :

.

4

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Wa bincton

6

Le,, \ngtl", Ca. ~t.rth 23-25

I

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LSL

7

\ational (ha P••• hip S..ltle, \\ a. April 2

10

\ICR.9

Dayton

I

Oklahoma

2 1

8

Temple

EAST

9

St. John"•

~. Carolina 1 I

5

Auburn

Richmond

I

12

'

4

Rider Northea • tern

Indiana

V1rgioia Comm. 6 , 1

AtlJntt, Ga. ~!arck 22-24

~I

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Syracuse

I

7

Virginia

,ol

Iona

21

Arkansas

Seattle, W,. Marth JI

8

ll1inoi1 St.

\IID\\EST

9 ,

Alabama

1

DePaul

5

KanHI

Houston Baptist

12

Alcorn State

Wake Forest 4

6

Memphis SL

I. Louis, \lo. 1arcb 23-25

Oral Roberts 11

1

LOS ANGELES TIMES MAR l 2 1984

3

Purdue

7

Fresno St.

Louisiana Tech 10

Houston 2 • rirst- and s.....nd-round sites ~ill be placed in th• brad,t bt the Di,ision 1Men·s Basketbtll Committee \larch 11.

JSD D feats Army in Baseball, 7-4 SA DIEGO-Th Umvers1ty of San Diego used 10 ,its to beat Army, 7 4, Sunday In nonconference college aseball at Alcala Park , The wm put USO s record at 10-11-1; 1t was Army s pener · f Mike Fazekas of U D pitched 3½ inmngs of rehe to un h1 record to 2-0. When Fazekas replaced starter 'om Seyler m the iXth, th game was tied, 2-2. F~zekas , nded the inning on his fir t pitch, which Army s Enk .ve.rton hit Into a double play.

goo State (22-6) of the Pacific 10 and Brigham Young (19- 10) of the Western Athletic Conference. Among the teams passed over by the selection commit- tee were No. 19 Weber State at 22-7, Lamar at 25-4, Bucknell at 24-5 Tennessee-Chattanooga at 23-6, WAC tournament runner-up New Mexico at 24-10, Montana at 23-7 and both Notre Dame and UCLA at 17-11. The draw again was hard on Western teams, five of which are paired off against one another in the early rounds of the West Regional. Pac-10 winner Washington

faces Nevada-Reno in the first round, with that winner meeting Duke. University of San Diego is in the same bracket with Nevada-Las Vegas and UTEP. PCAA Tournament champ Fresno State gets Louisiana Tech in the first round of the Midwest Regionals with the winner facing Houston. Oregon State faces West Virginia in the first round of the Mideast Regional with the winner meeting Maryland. BYU draws Alabama-Birmingham as a quick stepping stone to Kentucky.

BLADE TRIBUNE

TIMES-ADVOCATE MAR 1 2 1984

~--

Brovelli happy playoff-bound Toreros not also rans any longer

Even loss can't tarnish Tar Heels USO draws Ivy champ Princeton in NCAA first round KANSAS CITY, Mo. CUPll - A loss couldn't knock North Carolina out of the top spot in the ratings, nor could it knock the Tar Heels out of the top spot in the 5.Heam NCAA Tournament bracket.

Never mind

that

they're being

shipped aero. the country to play a team 60 miles from IL~ home, Jim Bro- velli ls ju t happy his University of San DI go men's basketball team Is finally In the CAA playoffs. Sunday, It was announced that the 18-9 Toreros. champions of the West Coast Athletic Conf!'rnce were b Ing shipped to Phllad lphla to play 17-9 Princeton, the Ivy Ll•agui, Champion in a preliml• nary-round game on Tue.day. KSDO Radio ( 1130) and I>:SPN-TV will carry USD'. game live on Tuesday at 6:30p.m. "After five years a al o rans, I'm Just happy to be In the tournament " Hrovelll aid 'All I konw about Princ~- ton is that It won th,• Ivy League and the school ha a reputation ot turning out good, m1•ntally tough basketball teams" If the Toreros brat Princeton. they'll have to face evada Las Vegas on 'fhursday in a We t Hegionals first- round ame at Salt Lake City. --------

North Carolina took a 21-0 record and a No. l ranking into a game against Arkansas in Pine Bluff on Feb. 12 but was upset 65-64. No matter: the Tar Heels were right back on top of the ratings the very next day by vote of the coaches. North Carolina stayed No. l for the remainder of the regular season but suffered its second loss Saturday in the semifinal round of the Atlantic Coast Conference Tournament. being eliminated by Duke Tl-75. Still, the 'Zl-2 Tar Heels were awarded the top seed in the 1984 NCAA Tournament the next day by a nine-member selection committee chaired by Dave Gavitt. The committee also paired the University of San Diego against Ivy League champion Princeton in a first round Eastern Regional game Tuesday in Philadelphia (6:_~P-.1!1· San !J.ieg~o tin_le, KSDO radio). --~

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