Smith, Kentucky made the right choice
Posted: Tue January 13, 1998 at 9:43 PM ET
Several days before Tubby Smith
agreed to become coach at
Kentucky, a columnist with the
Lexington Herald-Leader urged him
not to take the job.
If he did, Merlene
Davis wrote, "I sincerely fear for
your safety and the safety of your
family."
"Kentucky fans aren't ready
for a black head coach," added
Davis, who is black. "The first time
you lose a game, you will not be
called a stupid coach. You will be
called a stupid black coach."
On December 27 Smith's 'Cats not only
lost, but lost to unranked, sub-.500,
blood-rival Louisville.
Yet in the two
weeks since that debacle, Smith
tells me he hasn't had a single
comment, letter or phone call
directed his way with the slightest
racial slant to it.
Given Kentucky's
reluctance to integrate under
legendary coach Adolph Rupp, Smith
doesn't fault Davis for writing her
column.
But Smith says the column
"was like a challenge. As if she were
saying to people, 'Prove me wrong.'"
So far, the good citizens of the
Commonwealth have.
Sorting out the teams
January is Sodium Pentothol Month,
a time for sorting out the season's
frauds from the for-reals.
SMU puffed
out to a 10-0 start by gorging on the
likes of Austin College and Florida
Atlantic. Marquette ran up the same
record, beating
Wisconsin-Milwaukee and Central
Florida along the way.
Now both are
1-2 in their respective leagues.
Contrast their fortunes with those of
Cincinnati and UNLV.
Unranked and
crippled by suspensions, Cincinnati
has ripped off seven straight wins,
and forward Ruben Patterson will
return to the lineup for Sunday's
game at Louisville.
UNLV, at 8-5, didn't
get a single vote in the coaches' poll
this week, even though every one of
the Runnin' Rebels' losses is to a
Top 25 team.
Mark it down: Come
tournament time, Vegas and Cincy
are going to be a whole lot more
threatening than SMU or Marquette.
Staying in school may be cool
Some 47 underclassmen came out
for the NBA draft last spring, the
largest number of early exits ever.
But college basketball could be
spared a similar exodus this year.
Underclassmen like Mike Bibby,
Antawn Jamison and Paul Pierce
must declare their intention to leave
school by May 10, and the looming
labor conflict between the NBA and
its players surely won't be settled
by then.
A work stoppage wouldn't
just affect veterans. No rookies
would get paid, either.
For those
undergraduates wrestling with
whether or not to go pro, that
uncertainty could be just enough to
keep them in school for another
season.
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