Basketball diaries, part 16: Me, Pitino & Tubby

The fall of 2000 was important to me for twos reasons - 1. Long-time IU coach Bob Knight was fired by the school; and 2. I got my dream job.
Life was going pretty well for me. In fact it was probably better than ever.
In the fall of 2000 I got a voicemail (on my girlfriend's birthday no less) from the sports editor at the Courier-Journal in Louisville. He told me that there was an opening in the sports department that I might be interested in. That was the call that I had been waiting for since I got into the business. It was the phone call I had waited for for all of my professional career. After a couple interviews I got the job and happily returned home (literally, I moved all my belongings into my dad's house) and I couldn't have been happier. I grew up reading the C-J and working for that paper was my ultimate goal when I got into the newspaper business.
"I'll be here 20 years," I told a woman on the elevator one of my first nights in the building. I'll put in some time on the high school beat then slowly work my way up...I thought anyway.
My first nine months or so were pretty normal, covering mostly high school sports.

But on the last day of August in 2001 when I got a last-minute assignment. It was to cover a golf outing between Rick Pitino and Tubby Smith. It was going to be the first real public matchup/meeting between the two colleagues (Smith was a Pitino assistant and later succeeded him at Kentucky and won a national championship) since Pitino took the job at UofL. So I guess the editors figured someone had to at least show up to make an appearance and document the meeting.

I e-mailed the UK sports information department and let them now I would be attending. It was something new and different for me since I'd been at the paper and probably my biggest assignment to date. It was definitely bigger than covering a Friday night football game or doing the Scorecard on a Sunday or Monday night.

It was the type of thing I had dreamed of when I took the job. I'm not quite sure how I ended up with the assignment, but my guess is everyone else had other obligations and I was pretty much the last resort.

The next morning I woke up and drove to Lexington. I didn't know what to expect so I found someone, who was somewhat in charge, someone from the UK SID department I imagine. When the scramble began I grabbed a spare golf cart and tagged along behind the Pitino & Tubby foursome. Doing the same thing was Jerry Tipton, the long-time UK basketball beat writer for the Lexington Herald-Leader. He was the competition and he was following the group just like me.

After a few holes of me pretty much stalking the group I looked up at the tee box and Pitino was walking toward me.

"Hi, what's your name?" he asked extending his hand.

I told him my name and who I was working away and then I asked him if I could ask him a couple of questions. I did, mostly about what it was going to be like to go back to UK. He was very cordial and nice and answered my questions before he had to tee off. Maybe he came to me to get away from Tipton, who he had an icy relationship with during his time in Lexington. Or maybe he just wanted to find out who I was, either way I was happy that he approached me and broke the ice.

I continued to follow them for 18 holes. At one point former UK athletic director C.M. Newton made a surprise stop and visited with the coaches for a few minutes.

Here is my story:

By Josh Cook

Staff writer

LEXINGTON - They won't meet at midcourt in Rupp Arena for nearly four months, but Rick Pitino and Tubby Smith went head-to-head yesterday.

The basketball coaches were on opposing twosomes in the second annual University of Kentucky vs. University of Louisville Golf Challenge at the University Club of Kentucky. The event pits athletic departments from the schools, as well as 60 fans.

It wasn't the pair's first meeting since Pitino took over at UofL in March, but it could be their last until the showdown in Rupp on Dec. 29.

"It'll be just fine," Pitino said of his first visit to Rupp as an opposing coach. "The Kentucky people have been just great to me."

Yesterday's meeting had far less at stake. There was no foot-stomping by Pitino or icy stares from Smith. Just two friends getting together for golf and good-natured ribbing - from Smith asking Pitino where his red was (answer: a Louisville logo on his shorts) to Pitino moving the pin away as Smith prepared to putt.

"Tubby and I are good friends, and we haven't played together in eight years," Pitino said. "He was a bad golfer then, he's a good golfer now. I guess that shows you what Kentucky's done for him."

According to Pitino, his handicap has gone from 9 to 16 since he resigned from the Boston Celtics.

It didn't show on the first tee, where his drive landed in the middle of the fairway, while Smith's strayed to the second fairway. On the second hole, though, Pitino topped his tee shot into a hazard, then after a drop put his next shot into some thick brush.

"I think I'm going to watch this hole," he said. "Anybody want to talk basketball or horse racing for a hole?"

Conversation between the coaches drifted to basketball only occasionally. Once came after an impressive drive by Smith.

"If I had his players I'd swing like that too," Pitino said, referring to a team that has been pegged by some as the preseason No. 1.

The rest of the time the coaches focused on golf.

Smith teamed with UK golf coach Brian Craig to beat Pitino and UofL golf coach Mark Crabtree 4 and 3 in match play.

"We had a lot of fun," Smith said, "seeing Rick and being around him, and you really don't get a chance to socialize with a lot of Cardinal fans. Guess what, they all don't have horns. I'm just kidding. It's great people and a great time."

I didn't include everything that happened in the story, though. With a few holes to go, during a break in the again, Pitino strolled over again.

"Scoot over," he said, sliding into the driver's seat. Within seconds he was mashing on the gas pedal and the wheels were spinning. He zipped over toward the bathrooms for a pee break. At that point I'd already asked him the questions I wanted to, so I just tried to make some small talk and come up with a couple of more questions. It was an almost surreal experience. For years I had looked up to Pitino when I was a UK fan, now here I was sitting next to him, talking to him as he drove the golf cart to go take a leak. I couldn’t believe it.

I asked him if he was as competitive at golf as he was at coaching.

"Not anymore," he said. Then told me a little how it felt when he lost someone close to him recently in a car accident. It was a little peak into Rick Pitino the man, not the basketball coach. Of course 10 days later Pitino would lose someone close to him again when his brother-in-law and best friend, Billy Minardi, was killed in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Life would never be the same for any of us.

Basketball diaries, part 11: College years

The final three years of college I attended Indiana University.


There was the first midnight madness practice at IU and I went accompanied by a girlfriend.


There was the time when my friends, Troy, Joe, Michael and myself, went to pick up our season tickets for IU basketball games.


There was the time I went to a Valentine's Day game against Michigan and the Fab Five. That was also the year that we attended parties where IU players attended and they were treated like rock stars on campus.


There was also the time that my friend Troy and I tried to be extras in the movie Blue Chips.


There was the time my junior year when I had my best intramural basketball game, scoring 22 points (I hit six three-pointers), but it also was a year of a lot of self-doubt. I spent a lot of time throwing myself into basketball.


There was my senior year when I missed the beginning of the NCAA Tournament for the first time that I could remember as I went on a spring break trip with my friend Troy, and a bunch of people we didn't know, in Arizona. On our way back I also found out that Michael Jordan was returning to the NBA! It was a great day.


How do I convert to an IU fan? It's like converting from Roman Catholic to Jewish, or from a Yankees fan to a Red Sox fan. From a Michigan fan to an Ohio State fan. Two complete opposites. I hated Bob Knight. Hated him. How could I do it?
Well it definitely helped that the Hoosiers were great in the 1992-93 season. The Hoosiers had gone 27-7 in the 1991-92 season, losing to Knight's former pupil, Coach K at Duke in the national semifinal.
That season started off with an 87-72 loss to UCLA in the Tipoff Classic in Springfield, Mass. But the Hoosiers rolled through the Big Ten season with a 14-4 record and then into the NCAA Tournament where they were a #2 seed in the West Region.
IU beat Shaquille O'Neal and LSU in the second round of the NCAAs that year, then surprising Florida State in the Round of 16 to get a rematch with UCLA. This time around the Hoosiers humiliated the Bruins 106-79 in Albuquerque, N.M. to earn their first Final Four bid since winning it all in 1987.
The Hoosiers lost to Duke (which had barely escaped Kentucky on Christian Laettner's last-second shot) 81-78 in Minneapolis, Minn. as the Blue Devils went on to win their second straight national championship.
The Hoosiers returned most of the key players from that squad the next year and were ranked high in the preseason publications and rankings.
They opened up the season by winning the Preseason NIT, beating Murray State (103-80) and 17th-ranked Tulane (102-92) in Bloomington, then No. 7 Florida State (81-78) in the semifinals and No. 6 Seton Hall in the finals (78-74).
IU never shied away from scheduling big-time teams in the pre-conference schedule and after a short layoff they played third-ranked Kansas in the RCA Dome (the last remants of the old Big Four Classic). The Hoosiers fell 74-69 to Roy Williams' team.
IU then won seven in a row - including a win over 19th-ranked Cincinnati, before facing Kentucky on Jan. 3 in a nationally-televised game at Freedom Hall in Louisville.
This was the first time I was truly tested as to who I would root for. My dad and I sat in the IU section, behind one of the baskets, but the place was backed and it was a sea of half-red and half-blue. The arena was split evenly. The Wildcats were ranked No. 3 in the country and boasted one of the nation's best players in Jamal Mashburn, the burly do-it-all forward for UK.
UK won a classic 81-78 as four players scored 28 points - Mashburn, Cheaney, Travis Ford and Matt Nover.
The Hoosiers began Big Ten play three days later with a win over eighth-ranked Iowa 75-67 in Assembly Hall. It was the first of 13 consecutive victories by the Hoosiers. During that span they beat six more ranked teams - at No. 2 Michigan 76-75, at 13th-ranked Purdue 74-65, vs. No. 24 Ohio State 96-69, at No. 9 Iowa 73-66, vs. No. 4 Michigan 93-92 and vs. 14th-ranked Purdue 93-78.
Several of those games stand out, including the Valentine's Day one-point win over Michigan. But the one just previous to that was a huge victory. It was 88-84 in double overtime at Penn State. The Nittany Lions had the Hoosiers beat late in regulation, but a foul call on a long in-bounds pass gave IU new life and they would eventually win the game.
The Hoosiers lost at unranked Ohio State, and former Hoosier Lawrence Funderburke, 81-77 on Feb. 23 to end their streak - amazingly it was their only Big Ten loss of the season. They won their final four regular-season games to cap off an incredible 17-1 conference campaign.
With only three losses, and one in the Big Ten, IU went into the NCAA Tournament as the No. 1 team in the country. They were the No. 1 seed in the Midwest Region and played their first two games in Indianapolis. They clobbered Wright State 97-54 in the first round, then had a close shave against 22nd-ranked Xavier in the second round, winning 73-70.
That took the Hoosiers to St. Louis, where they faced 15th-ranked Louisville in the Round of 16. It was a matchup between probably the two greatest colleges coaches of the 1980s and 90s - Knight and Denny Crum. Knight's more talented team prevailed 82-69 with Cheaney's dunk over Morton, which led to some jawing and an infamous picture in the Courier-Journal the next day.
The Hoosiers missed Henderson dearly, though, in their next game and lose 83-77 to Kansas for the second time in the season. They finished an incredible 31-4.
Later that night my roommate and his girlfriend and myself and I girlfriend were coming back from somewhere and arriving at our dorm, which was just across the parking lot from Assembly hall when we saw some buses across the way. We all ran, even the girls, to see what was going on. It was the team returning home from St. Louis. We were four of probably 75 or 100 people who had happened upon the team and we were all in clapping and cheering as they made their way off the bus and back into Assembly Hall.
At that moment, I was an Indiana fan.
Some might say they should/would have won the national championship that year if not for Alan Henderson's late-season knee injury.
Calbert Cheaney was everybody's All-American that year. And even national Player of the Year in some cases. And who could blame the voters? The silky smooth forward averaged 22.4 points per game.
Explosive two-guard Greg Graham averaged 16.5 pppg, while Henderson scored 11.1, Matt Nover 11 and Damon Bailey 10.1.
Another shooting guard Pat Graham got injured and only played 13 games that season. Brian Evans was a couple of years before he was the Big Ten Player of the Year, but he averaged 5.3 points as a reserve that season and had a much Valentine's Day game against Michigan. The Hoosiers also got help from Chris Reynolds (3.2 ppg, 102 assists in 35 games) and Todd Leary (4.8 ppg), who almost single-handedly brought IU back in its national semifinal loss to Duke the previous season with a barrage of late three-pointers.

On March 4, 1993 Cheaney hit a baseline jumper to become IU's and the Big Ten's all-time career scoring leader. He finished the game with 35 points in IU's 98-69 win over Northwestern. He would finish his career with 2,613 points.
On March 10 Greg Graham scored 32 points in IU's 99-68 win over Michigan State to clinch (at that time) an unprecedented 19th Big Ten championship for the Hoosiers, and their 11th under Knight.
On March 25 in the NCAA's Round of 16 Cheaney scored 32 points, and barked in the face of UofL player Dwayne Morton after a dunk, to lead the Hoosiers to an 82-69 win over Louisville in St. Louis. His output in that game allowed him to eclipse Scott May's single-season scoring record (752 points in '76).
The walls came tumbling down against Kansas in the Elite Eight, though.


Henderson tried to play in the NCAAs, but he was nowhere near the same player he had been.

Basketball diaries, part 7: Last-second shot

Every kid dreams of taking, and making, the last-second shot in a basketball game, especially growing up where I did. I had that chance in the eighth grade, but it took awhile to get to that point.
I first played organized basketball in the fourth grade. At that time I was one of the tallest kids on the team, which would turn out to be ironic because by the time I was in the eighth grade I was one of the smallest on the team. It took me that long to have the opportunity to affect the outcome of a game with my shot.
I played on my first organized team when I was in the fourth grade at St. Bernard grade school. It was the Navy blue team (we didn't have team names, must to my dismay, we were only known by our uniform colors). This would've been around 1983. To give you an idea of how long ago it was, there were jump balls at the beginning of every quarter. That first year, as it turns out, would be the establishing point for the rest of my playing career in grade school.
That year I scored one, maybe two baskets the entire season. I was the second team center, which I didn't figure was too bad, especially since our first-team center was built like a mountain.
Of course playing inside wasn't something that was my fortay. I considered myself and outside shooter, those were my favorite shots. In fact the only field goal I can vividly remember hitting that season was a deep shot from the corner. And it happened in my most memorable game of the year. It was a double-overtime game that we eventually lost. I played a lot that game, though, because our center fouled out. At one point late in the game I was standing at the free throw line and after a successful attempt by one of my teammates I jumped for joy. Afterward my dad asked me why I did that.
"Because I thought we were going to win," I said.
Unfortunately we didn't.
The next year was my first playing for a school team, St. Athanasius. I was in the fifth grade and me, and the rest of my friends, made the fifth & sixth grade 'B' team. I was a bench player, again backing up some of the other big men on the team. I played in almost every game, but I'm pretty sure I didn't score. I remember having two free throw tries in one game, but I missed them both. My most memorable game from that season was our last game, a loss in the tournament. I went home and cried after that game, and not because we lost and not because I had missed UK big man Melvin Turpin scoring 42 points in a game, but I was upset because I hadn't played for the first time all season. When I got home I threw myself on my bed and began crying.
That may have been the first time that I realized that even though I loved the sport, and spent most of my time either talking about basketball, or playing it, that I just wasn't that good. I played constantly, whether outside in my driveway or on my NERF goal or the other inside goal that I had in my house. But most of the time I was just shooting and not really playing against anyone else, so I wasn't really able to better my skills against competition. My fourth grade season was fun because I got to regularly play two quarters regardless. But my fifth grade year basketball became more about winning games and losing games and if my team wanted to win a game then it was probably best that I didn't play. The one bright spot of my fifth grade year was, though, that I played on the team with a lot of my friends. Including my best friend, Adam (see previous entry).
In the sixth grade I started a new school, Lanesville Elementary, in southern Indiana where my mom and dad were building a house. Unfortunately it wasn't done by the time school started, and wouldn't be done until around November. I was certain I was going to play basketball that year, especially since my new friend John, who had also transferred into school, was going to play too. But after signing up for the team there was something called "conditioning" that I had to go to before practice started. And when I showed up the first day I found out that it would involve a whole lot of running. I was never a big runner (although I did a brief stint on the track team at St. A's) and after the first day I'd had enough. What was all this running? It wasn't for me, that much I knew. I remember a lot of running, and a lot of sucking wind. I went home that night and told my mom that I didn't want to play basketball that year. Of course my dad thought I should "tough it out" and go through conditioning, but my mom won out. Looking back it was a bad decision, I wish I would've stuck it out, it would've been good for me.
To make matters worse that year Adam came out to see me and spend the night with me after we moved to Lanesville. After a short time together I could easily see (we were at odds with each other after just a short time together) that we were already growing apart and we weren't going to be friends for much longer. I went to one game that season to see my friends play, but that was about it. Meanwhile I continued to shot a lot outside on the court at my new house (which was much bigger and better than my old one) and on my NERF goal in the house.
The summer before my seventh grade year my home got a job (as a junior high teacher?!) at a school called Sacred Heart in nearby Jeffersonville, so I was headed to my second new school in as many years and my third school in three years overall.
But unlike Lanesville, where I joined a class that included my female cousin, when I started at Sacred Heart I didn't know a soul. I was fairly shy and not very out-going as the year started, but I did make a few friends, but no one I could consider a "good friend." But still by the time basketball season rolled around I was ready to start playing and the good thing about this team was there was...no conditioning. But the bad thing was that the team had "cuts," cutting the players deemed not good enough to make either the junior high 'A' team or 'B' team.
The team was coached by Bruce Wright, the father of one of the prettiest girls in my class. He was a little gruff, but he seemed to like what I did early in practice. In one of the first practices he put me on the second team, scrimmaging against the first team. I think he liked my defense (actually he praised me for that in one of the earlier practices, much to my delight) because I probably wasn't shooting very much. I wasn't one of the taller kids anymore, so he had me at guard. I definitely wasn't a very good guard because dribbling wasn't one of my strong suits, although I could still shoot decently from the outside.
However a couple of more practices the truth about my game quickly became evident. I was a forward trapped in a guard's body. I could shoot, but I couldn't handle the ball. As the last practice before "cuts" neared I became more and more nervous. I had never been "cut" from anything in my life and I had never been fond of rejection (something that would stay true the rest of my life). As that practice came to a conclusion coach Wright called three or four of us over during free throw shooting. He told us all that it just didn't look like that there was going to be a place for us on the team this year. He also told us who were seventh graders that if we worked hard maybe we could come back and make the team the next year. I didn't hear much after that...I was crushed.
Somehow I made it back to the free throw lane where I had been. There was a lump in my throat and tears in my eyes as I waited for coach to dismiss us. I quickly walked past my dad with my head down and out the door and to the car. I didn't say a word until we were in the car, then I burst into tears. I calmed down after a minute or two, but the 20-minute ride home that night felt like 120 minutes. During the drive dad told me that I just needed to work harder between now and next year. I was still in bad shape by the time we got home. I didn't want to face my mom, so I quickly made a beeline to my room (luckily it was right inside from the door to the garage). But when she came in with some Soft Batch cookies (my favorites) I burst into tears again. I guess either my dad had given her some updates from when he had watched practice and she got the cookies to console me, or they were going to be a reward for making the team. Nothing either one of them could have said, or give me, was going to make it any better. It was the most humiliating (how was I going to face the kids tomorrow at school? Luckily I was new so no one really knew me) and most disappointing day of my life to that point.
The next year, as an eighth grader, I made the junior high team. I don't know that I had dramatically improved, my making the team was probably more a product of a not-very-good group of seventh graders. I was usually the eighth or ninth man off the bench during 'A' team games, but Coach Wright did give me the chance to start on 'B' team.
I scored four points over the entire season, and I can easily remember both baskets. But it was one of the baskets that I missed that stands out more than the others.
First to the two I made. The first came in a 'B' team game when we played against a local public school called Silver Creek. Again I considered myself a good shooter, but I didn't shoot much in games. So when I swished a shot in a 'B' game Travis Cox, a seventh grader who started on the 'A' team, jumped up and down with big eyes when it went in. I wasn't very surprised, though, just happy it had gone in.
My second, and final basket of the season came in our last game. In fact they were our team's last points of the season. It was in the closing seconds of our tournament loss. With our team's fate sealed coach Wright had put me, and some of the other little-used players, into the game. With the clock winding down I got the ball in the middle of the free throw lane. I hesitated for a second, then shot over the outstretched arm of a defender. The buzzer sounded seconds later and our season was over. Some of my teammates were sad, but I was happy that I had scored. Afterward a kid on the other team even told me, "Good shot."
But back to the one I missed. It came during a game in a Christmas tournament that my team was playing in. It was at a local public school called GRC in Clarksville against Holy Family, one of our primary rivals. Surprisingly I played a lot that day since Travis got into foul trouble and the day before I had had a good practice shooting the ball. It was enough to impress the assistant coach, who was coaching the game because coach Wright couldn't be there for all the game. When Travis picked up two quick fouls the assistant coach turned to me and told me to go into the game. It was so early, and unusual for me to be in the game that soon, that when I checked in I looked up into the stands and saw my dad reading the newspaper, which my mom quickly told him to put down. I didn't do much in the game. I rarely looked to shoot because I didn't want to screw up (although I did step over the endline once when in-bounding the ball resulting in a turnover for our team). In the second half Travis got into foul trouble again, and again I was called on to sub for him. Down the stretch the game was tight. With under 10 seconds left we had the ball down by two points. During a timeout the assistant coach drew up a play to try to get the ball to our big man, Justin. Needless to say I was going to be the fifth option on the play. But Holy Family pressured us full-court so when my best friend, Shannon (the team point guard), got the ball across halfcourt I broke open along the left sideline. Spying me open Shannon threw the cross-court pass. I caught it, took one dribble then with my mental clock counting down the seconds in my head...as I had done countless times on just about every basketball goal I'd ever shot at. It was my first shot of the game, but it felt good as it came out of my hands. The ball banked off the backboard and...off the rim. Holy Family rebounded. The game was over.
"Did you mean to bank it?" my dad asked me after the game.
"Yes," I said.
I felt bad that I missed the shot, but good that I got to play so much. But the day got better. Afterward we went over to my Granny's house and watched the UK-UofL game and I saw one of the greatest performances of all-time as Rex Chapman, UK's freshman phenom, bombed the Cardinals with three-pointers and dunks in a the most lopsided victory in the series to that point, 85-51. Chapman scored 26 points that afternoon, including a buzzer-beating jumper to end the first half. It was a shot that every childhood Kentucky fan would replay at the court at their house. Three...two...one...
Some of us hit them, and some of us don't.

Basketball diaries, part 6: Scooter, Rodney & Me, UofL Basketball Camp 1983

During my fourth grade year I did two significant things, I played on my first basketball team (St. Bernard) and I got a best friend – Adam.
Adam and I had the same home room that year and while I had known him for the first three years of school I didn’t really know him that well. We soon struck up a friendship over basketball, and we did so probably out of dislike for the other’s favorite team. Adam was a UofL fan and I was a UK fan. And to make things even better, we didn’t even like the same pro basketball teams. That year I had adopted the Philadelphia 76ers as my favorite team, because I loved the way Dr. J played, while Adam liked the Los Angeles Lakers. Still we got along great. Adam was the first friend whose house I ever spent the night at, and vice versa. We would stay up late watching music videos (what was that new thing, MTV?) and talking, mostly about basketball and how bad UK would beat UofL or vice versa. Well, we finally got our wish that year, but unfortunately for me, UofL beat UK 80-68 in the “Dream Game” on its way to the Final Four. (But my 76ers beat his Lakers in the NBA Finals a couple of months later).
Well that summer Adam asked me to go to overnight basketball camp with him at UofL. While I didn’t like Louisville at all, I still agreed to go to its basketball camp because my love of basketball was stronger than my hate for UofL. Plus, I thought, how fun would it be to spend a week playing basketball with my best friend?
As I packed to get ready for camp, so I prepared like any kid my age would, I packed up everything I had. But it was going to be just like going off to college for a week, we even had our own dorm room, so I made like a college student and took my TV too. It was my first extended time away from home, but I had spent plenty of nights at Adam’s house, so I wasn’t really worried about being away from home. I did, however, have to give my mom 100 kisses before I left to make up for the 20 that I usually gave her each night before I went to sleep.
We checked into camp the first day and it was just like spending the night at Adam’s house, we stayed up late talking basketball and watching TV. We watched the first USFL championship game in our room that night, as the Michigan Panthers beat my beloved Philadelphia Stars (since I picked up the 76ers I decided to pick up every pro team from Philadelphia as my favorite that year and it worked out well too, considering the Phillies made it to the World Series before losing to the Baltimore Orioles-sorry about your baseball card Rick Dempsey). But sadly Kelvin Bryant, Chuck Fusina and Jim Mora couldn't beat Bobby Hebert and Anthony Carter.
We basically ate, slept and drank basketball.
In the mornings we’d have breakfast, then go to daily stations before breaking for lunch, then coming back for games and speakers in the afternoons. After that we’d have dinner, then we had night league games before wrapping up around 8 or 9. It didn’t leave time for much else, except maybe the occasional video game or two. The camp did a good job of keeping us on-the-go pretty much all of the time. The only real downtime we had was at night.
A couple nights later, though, before going to bed, we had some down time and I started to get sad. I was homesick. I missed my mom and dad and I must have been bored. I became a little upset and started to cry. “You’re homesick,” Adam told me.
I didn’t know what to do so I said I was going to go down the hall and call them from the payphone. “Hurry up, I think I’m getting homesick too,” Adam said as I walked out the door.
I went down the hall and called home. My mom answered the phone and I almost instantly burst into tears, I told her I wanted to come home and I wanted to come home tonight.
She tried to talk me out of it, my dad got on the phone too, but by that time I was crying pretty good. I was in new surroundings and didn’t know many people and was probably kind of scared too. I was still talking to my mom when I noticed someone came up behind me. It was the floor counselor, everyone called him "Mad Dog."
He asked me what was wrong and I told him. He asked if he could talk to my parents and I said yes. ”Hang on mom, Mad Dog wants to talk to you," I was able to push out.
"Who?" she asked, sounding both concerned and startled.
He got on the phone and talked to my mom and dad and told them that he would look after me and make sure I was okay. He was a really nice guy, who was kind of chubby, but I never knew why they called him Mad Dog because he was being really nice to me.
He invited me into his room and I asked if I could go get Adam too, so I did and Adam brought his video basketball game and I started playing it. After a few minutes there was a knock on the door and in walked Lancaster Gordon, a starting guard for UofL and a future first-round NBA draft pick. He and Mad Dog were friends and Mad Dog introduced Adam and I, so then I started playing the basketball game again and this time I started using the names of UK and UofL players and announcing the game as I played it. I was actually letting Louisville do pretty well, especially Lancaster Gordon, he made plenty of shots that night. Even though I was a UK fan I still knew Lancaster Gordon was a good basketball player and I knew that it was cool to be in the same room with him, so it was pretty exciting for me and for Adam too, who was a big UofL fan. (Darrell Griffith also came to speak to us at camp too).
I stayed in Mad Dog’s room for probably an hour, maybe a little less, until I was tired, then Adam and I went back to our room and went to sleep.
The next day, though, the homesickness came back. My dad dropped by during our early morning stations to see how I was doing and the second I saw him I started to get upset. He took me out into a hallway outside the gym where I told him I wanted to go home. I begged him to take me to Granny’s house. I started crying so hard in fact that my nose began to bleed. Dad took me to the bathroom and eventually my nose stopped bleeding, but he wouldn’t let me go home. I had planned with Adam to stay the whole week, so I was going to stay, he said.
On our floor at the dorm I became known as the homesick kid. It seemed that people were nicer to me. Adam’s mom and sister came over one night for a visit and his sister, Amy, who was three or four years younger than us, said to me: “I heard you were homesick.”
Other things didn't help. One afternoon I was playing a video game on the ground floor of the dorm and I was doing well, then a group of kids came along and messed with me and my game, ending it. It was things like that that every kid goes through in life and are forced to deal with on their own that just added to the troubles I was having.
Friday, the final day of camp, couldn’t come soon enough for me, but by then I was feeling better anyway, even though it probably was because I knew I was going home that day. Since it was the final day of camp we had individual competitions during our stations and I actually didn’t do too bad. In one shooting competition, where you had to alternate shooting behind chairs at the free throw line I started making lots of shots in a row and after I got done shooting I had the best score (somebody would come after me and beat it though). Afterwards one of the kids came up to me, surprised by how well I had shot, and asked me who I thought I was.
"Dr. J," I responded like any kid would quickly come up with the name of their idol.
"No, I know who I am, I was asking who you were," he retorted quickly.
When camp ended later that day I got some ribbons, a new T-shirt that read, “Scooter, Rodney and Me, Albuquerque 1983" and a good sense of what it was like to be on my own and not have my parents around to protect me all the time. I learned more in that week than I probably had throughout most of my life up to that point, you know what, I’ve still got that T-shirt too.

Basketball diaries, part 5: I'm in the UK locker room!

It wasn’t too long after my parents reconciled that the three of us went on a weekend trip to Lexington for some fun and probably to celebrate our reunion as a family. We planned it after one of my mom’s friends from school had come up with three tickets to a UK basketball game. I looked forward to that trip for weeks in advance because I knew it was going to be great to see UK play (it was during the 1982-83 season when the Wildcats eventually lost to UofL in the one, and only, Dream Game) and I knew we had good seats.
After having lunch together my dad and I got ready to go to the game, while my mom got ready to go shopping. As we prepared to leave my dad realized something – he didn’t have the tickets. He asked my mom if she had them, so she checked but she didn’t have them either. So for the next 15 minutes or so we scoured our hotel room looking for the tickets. After we had exhausted all of our options, including the trash, I was getting very nervous at that point, time was ticking down until tip-off and we still couldn’t find our tickets. Was I going to be able to go to the game, or not?
“What are we going to do?” I asked my dad.
“We’ll try and get some from a scalper,” he replied.
Now up until that point that word was foreign to me, so my dad had to explain to me that that was someone who sold tickets to the game outside of the arena. Sometimes you have to pay a little bit more, he explained.
So we drove to Rupp Arena, parked and began looking for people selling tickets.
“It’s illegal in Kentucky,” my dad explained, so most of the time the people selling the tickets couldn’t do it out in the open or be obvious about it. Knowing that I would’ve given up any, or all of the money I had in my piggy-bank for a ticket, it didn’t take long before my dad found a pair of seats for sale. He gave the man the money and we went inside.
Rupp Arena was just as I remembered it – huge! Besides being one of the biggest basketball arenas in the country, and usually sold out for games, I thought it was kind of like a big, over-sized barn that featured some seats that had restricted views due to beams being right in front of them. Of course I got to see most of it that day because when we started looking for our seats we realized that we had quite a ways to walk.
We climbed step after step and we kept getting higher and higher, but I wasn’t about to look back because I was a little scared of heights. But I knew we were getting high when I saw the alphabet ending (V...W...X...Y...Z) and the double-alphabet beginning (AA...BB...CC). We finally found our seats, just a couple of rows from the top.
“These are what they call the nosebleed seats, because they’re up so high,” my dad explained.
Because we thought we would have good seats we didn’t bring binoculars, but we sure needed them then. I couldn’t really tell the difference between the players, other than the color of their jerseys, they all looked like Smurfs to me. I remember being afraid to stand up during the national anthem and at some points during the game, because I thought I was going to just fall forward and straight down to the court, but I stood anyway.
UK won a game that was otherwise forgettable, but what happened after the game was one of the most memorable moments of my life.
As we had in our previous trip to Rupp Arena my dad and I lingered afterward. We walked down from our seats and made our way down to court level. It’s every kid’s dream in Kentucky to one day step on the Rupp Arena court and I was no different. But when we got down to the court they wouldn’t let us walk on it. I was a little disappointed, but I got to see the court up close so I was pretty happy about that. After being turned away from the court we started walking through the halls of Rupp, I’m not sure my dad knew where he was going, but soon we found ourselves outside the UK locker room.
There were probably 20 or 25 people out there, some friends and family as well as some other kids with their parents just hanging out. Suddenly a big fan opened up the locker room door and said, “Okay, let the kids in.”
I looked up at my dad and he gave me a nod and said, “Go ahead.”
“Sorry, just the boys,” the big man added. I looked next to me as I walked toward the door and a little girl turned around and walked back to her father.
I had never really done anything like this before on my own, walking into a room where I didn’t know anybody, much less in the Kentucky locker room to see players I had only seen on TV and who I loved and adored. I had taken my program with me and some of the other kids were going around and asking players for their autographs, so I decided to do the same thing.
Mostly I just walked up with my pen and program in hand and handed them in the direction of the player I wanted to sign. Some times I stammered, “Can I have your autograph…,” but most of the time I just held out my pen and the program and they knew what to do, they were pretty experienced at giving out their autographs. How cool it must be to have people ask for your autograph, I thought. I made my way around the room to different players.
Suddenly there they were right in front of me and in the flesh, some of them literally, and larger than life. Big Melvin Turpin, who earned the nickname “Dinner Bell” Mel because of his prodigious eating habits; Jim Master, a sharp-shooter from Indiana, who was probably my favorite player at the time; Kenny Walker, a skinny freshman who was playing a lot; and even injured star Sam Bowie (who later would have the dubious distinction of being drafted ahead of Michael Jordan in the 1984 NBA Draft) who was in his second redshirt season after breaking his leg. Some players were sitting and some were standing and some were even getting out of the shower. I walked around to most of the ones I knew and held out my pen and program and asked them for their autograph.
Some were in different stages of undress, some were just drying off from getting out of the shower and some were getting dressed, while others were still in their uniforms being interviewed by reporters (that would be me in about 20 years). Being small I was able to wedge myself between reporters, in some cases, and thrust my pen and program in a player's direction.
I got most of the ones I wanted, including Master, Turpin, Walker and my dad's favorite player, Tom Heintz, a bench warmer. I got several autographs, that afternoon but the one that still stands out to me was the one I received from Derrick Hord. Hord was a 6-4 swing forward who was a McDonald’s All-American out of high school, but who had had a productive, but unspectacular career at Kentucky. Word was that he was a great practice player, but in games he was just an average player. But he will always be an All-American in my book. That’s because as I approached him he was talking to a couple of people around him, but when he saw me he stopped and took my pen and program.
“What’s your name?” he asked.
I was completely in shock. In those days, and still in some cases today, basketball players, especially at UK, were treated like Gods, now suddenly one of the Gods was asking me a question.
“J-j-j-osh,” I stammered.
He scribbled something in the program, smiled and handed the program back to me.
I can still remember what it said: “Good luck Josh, best wishes Derrick Hord."
Looking back it really impresses me that he took the time to ask me my name and include it in a personalized message. I don't care how he finished in his career at UK. I don't care if he didn't live up to the hype, Derrick Hord will always be an All-American in my book.
For many years I considered that to be the best day of my life.

Basketball diaries, part 4: How basketball got my parents back together

Basketball has been something very strong in my life that has had a big affect on me and my life. Of course it is my love of basketball that also had an affect on the love of two of the most important people in my life – my mom and dad. That’s because I believe that my love for basketball (in an indirect way) is the reason that my parents, who had divorced early in 1978 (the year of UK’s fifth national title), got back together and eventually remarried. But a kitchen floor helped too.
It was a Friday night in 1983 (I was in the third grade) when my mom went to take a bath, to wash away the stresses of the week, and I decided that that was an opportune time to practice my dribbling in the kitchen. So I hit the kitchen in my usual indoor basketball uniform – shorts, a T-shirt and tube socks. However, that’s the last thing I remember.
The next thing I know is my mom is slapping my face, frantically crying, as I lay on the couch.
“Josh, are you okay?!” she screamed.
“Yes, I’m fine,” I replied, not too sure why she was slapping me.
Then she told me that she came in the kitchen and found me unconscious on the floor, evidently I had slipped and fallen and knocked myself out cold. I was still breathing, so she didn't call an ambulance, but she did call my dad. My mom was still frenzied when my dad arrived a few minutes later. I still wasn’t sure what all the excitement was about, I mean I had a little headache, but that was it. They took me to the emergency room and I got X-rayed for the first time in my life. I tried to talk them out of taking me to the ER, but they did anyway. The doctors couldn't find anything wrong with me on the X-ray, so they released me that night. I think they both tucked me into bed that night, something that hadn’t happened since I was very little. I’m not sure if my dad stayed over that night, but he soon began coming around more and more and he started staying overnight and on the weekends and soon he and mom were back together. And a short time after that they got remarried. And to me, basketball will always deserve an assist for that.

Basketball diaries, part 3: My first game

My first college basketball game was a memorable one.
I was probably in the first or second grade when my dad took me to a UK game at Rupp Arena. We lived more than an hour away from Lexington, so I’m sure it was a very excited car ride for me. I don’t remember how we got tickets or who UK was playing, but I know it wasn’t somebody very good. Actually my memories from that first game were big, literally. I just remember everything being so big! Rupp Arena itself was huge, it was like a big shopping mall to me. I remember first riding the escalator up, and later riding it down, and when I did I could look into what I remember as a huge toy store.
Of course once I got into the Rupp Arena itself I realized just what big was. I mean 23 or 24,000 people together in one place with one common goal – cheering the Cats on to victory – it was amazing! I know the team UK played was bad, and that they were winning the game handily because I remember late in the game the crowd was chanting “Booooo” for little-used reserve Bo Lanter and I remember the same cheers going up when another human-victory-cigar Chris Gettlefinger, who like me then had bright orange hair, went into the game.
Afterward I remember we stuck around for a few minutes and looked around at the huge arena as we walked out – it was big and so was that night! It was one of the biggest, and best, nights of my life to that point.

*****

My real religious love of basketball probably began when I was in the fourth grade and that’s when I started to memorize all the facts and the teams and the players, but before that I still loved the sport and loved to watch the games. I mean I remember bits and pieces of basketball stuff before then. I remember watching some of the local celebrations for UofL’s 1980 national championship team on TV. I remember the day that President Reagan got shot, but I don’t really recall watching IU beat North Carolina that night for the national championship. The following year I remember talk that UK and UofL might play in the NCAA Tournament, but that quickly disappeared after UK got beat by Middle Tennessee State (who?) in the opening round and a couple of weeks later I remember seeing highlights of North Carolina’s win over Georgetown in the national championship game and some skinny kid (who could that be?) hitting the game-winning shot.