The Naismith Hall of Fame has finally opened the door for three deserving college coaches– Rick Pitino of Louisville, 91-year-old retired Houston coach Guy V. Lewis and 83-year-old former UNLV coach Jerry Tarkanian– and will celebrate their careers this weekend in Springfield.
Pitino, who coached the Cardinals to a national championship last March, was considered a slam dunk, but there was a growing feeling that time might have passed Tarkanian and Lewis by and history and a pro-NBA voting block might have forgotten about their accomplishments and contributions to the sport.
Fortunately, new Hall of Fame selection chairman Jerry Colangelo, who is recognized for revitalizing Team USA after the 2004 Olympics, had the vision and the members of the honors committee had enough compassion to do the right thing before these two senior coaches fade into the sunset.
Lewis, who served in World War II and was a two-time all conference player at Houston, was known for clutching a brightly colored red and white polka dot towel and coached his alma mater Cougars to 27 straight winning seasons, 14 NCAA tournament appearances and five Final Fours in 30 years from 1956 through 1986. He was a major force in racial integration of college sports. He became one of the first coaches in the South to actively recruit African American players and his signing of Elvin Hayes and Don Chaney in 1964 was the prelude to an era of tremendous success at the school that was later emulated by Hall of Famer Don Haskins, who built his 1966 Glory Road national championship team at Texas Western around five African-American starters. The dominant play of Hayes led the Cougars to two Final Fours in 1967 and 1968 and forced lily white instate rivals to realize they needed follow suit if they wanted to be competitive.
Lewis was recognized as the 1968 National Coach of the Year and received a similar honor from the Associated Press in 1983. Lewis never had the same curb appeal as a Dean Smith or Bobby Knight as a coach, but he deserves credit for championing the once outlawed dunk as a high percentage shot and his acrobatic, up-tempo brand of basketball that emphasized dunking as a punctuation point to an offensive score helped market the sport among younger players in a football state, particularly in the cities of Dallas and Houston.
Lewis twice coached in historic games that helped increase the popularity of the game. In 1968, his underdog, Elvin Hayes-led Cougars upset the undefeated and top-ranked UCLA Bruins with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in front of 52,000 fans at Houston’s Astrodome. This was the first nationally televised college basketball game, and became known as the “Game of the Country.” Then, Lewis’ Phi Slama Jama teams with Hakeem Olajuwon and Clyde Drexler, went to three straight Final Fours from 1982 through 1984 and gained a reputation for their style of play as well as their overall success. At the height of Phi Slama Jama’s hype, the frat’ brothers suffered a dramatic, last-second 54-52 loss in the 1983 NCAA Final that became an iconic moment for Jimmy Valvano and his upstart ACC Wolfpack.
Lewis retired from coaching in 1986 with a 592-279 record and a .680 career winning percentage. In 1995, the University of Houston changed the official name of the on-campus basketball arena to “Guy V. Lewis Court at Hofheinz Pavillion” in honor of Lewis. Hayes, Drexler and Olajuwon all were selected to the Hall of Fame and in 1996 all three were selected as three of the 50 best players in the history of the NBA.
Lewis was hospitalized for a stroke on February 27, 2002. He later recovered, but experienced some lasting effects from the episode. Lewis maintains his residence in the University Oaks subdivision adjacent to the University of Houston, where he has lived since 1959. Lewis will be joined by his daughter, Sherry, and sons, Vern and Terry, in Springfield.
Tarkanian, the legendary former UNLV coach who was affectionately known as “Tark the Shark” had a 729-201 record at Long Beach State, UNLV and Fresno, had a 78 percent winning percentage and took four of his Vegas teams to the Final Four in 1977, 1987, 1990 and 1991.His 1990 Runnin’ Rebels with Larry Johnson, Stacy Augmon and Greg Anthony won the national championship, burying Duke, 103-73, in the championship game in Denver.
Hopefully, Tarkanian and his family will be able to be together in Springfield for his biggest moment.
He is suffering from deteriorating health.
Tarkanian suffered a mild heart attack in March 2012 and also spent time in a hospital last November. At an April 5 ceremony at the Final Four in Atlanta announcing he will be inducted into the Naismith Hall of Fame in September, Tarkanian arrived in a wheelchair, required help getting on and off stage. Tarkanian spent 11 days in a San Diego area hospital in July after suffering artery blockages and having a pacemaker and some stents installed. The 82-year-old coach left the hospital and returned to the San Diego-area condominium where he receives in-house nursing care. Tarkanian needs a walker to get around and his speech is slowed, but he still managed to make a pre-Naismith celebratory tour to meet with friends at his old haunts in Fresno at the end of last month.
His selection and that of Lewis, are long overdue, and have been rightfully based on their coaching achievements.
Tarkanian, who was known for his colorful personality that featured constantly chewing on a towel during games, might have been enshrined earlier if it had not been for his constant criticism and fiery conflicts with the NCAA, which made him Public Enemy No. 1 during his prime.
Tark’ was always a rebel, dating back to his days at Long Beach State when he became one of the first coaches to use three black starters and pioneered the use of junior college players to build Long Beach into a regional power that was so strong neighboring UCLA refused to schedule them.
He took his high scoring, up tempo offense, suffocating defense and Father Flanagan recruiting strengths with him to Vegas, where his program went from being known as “Tumbleweed Tech” to an overnight national sensation even though it was not a member of a major conference.
Tarkanian managed to weather constant NCAA scrutiny until he signed Lloyd Daniels, an enormously talented but personally troubled 6-9 guard from New York City. In 1987—just months before he was due to enroll– Daniels was caught buying crack cocaine from an undercover policeman in Vegas. Tarkanian had been known for taking in orphans off the streets, but he had no choice in this case but to announce Daniels would never play for UNLV.
Not long after Daniels’ arrest, reports emerged Daniels had been steered to UNLV by Richard Perry, a prominent gambler who had been convicted twice for sports bribery. Perry’s involvement set in motion another NCAA investigation, which ultimately resulted in the NCAA banning the Rebels from the 1991 NCAA Tournament only months after they won the title. The NCAA later agreed to a compromise which allowed UNLV to defend its title, but banned the Rebels from participation in the 1992 tournament and the turmoil eventually led to Tarkanian’s resignation after that season. In 1993, NCAA officials determined the school committed 28 violations involving the recruitment of Lloyd Daniels, which resulted in a three-year probation.
Tarkanian got something of a last laugh, though. He sued the NCAA, claiming it had harassed him for over two decades, building much of its cases on hearsay evidence. The harassment, Tarkanian claimed, started when he wrote a newspaper column alleging that the NCAA was more willing to punish less-prominent schools than brand-name programs. Although the NCAA did not admit to harassing Tarkanian, it settled out of court in 1998, paying him $2.5 million.
Tarkanian will always be beloved character in Vegas, where the school erected a statue at Thomas & Mack Center this summer, showing Tarkanian sitting in a folding chair clad in his trademark short-sleeved shirt and tie and holding a towel to his mouth.
Now, he and Lewis will have their accomplishments etched in stone while they can still enjoy it.
