Caution Advised on Calhoun's Nice Story

PHILADELPHIA -- Uh, oh. Jeff Adrien was posing for the cameras and woofing, enjoying this blowout a little too merrily. You could say it was a "Yo, Adrien!'' moment in Rocky Balboa's city, and while Connecticut was comfortably en route to a 92-66 rout of Texas A&M, my eyeballs instinctively shifted to his coach, Jim Calhoun, who doesn't suffer self-posturing well and needs no stress in his life.

Impressively, he handled the scene with aplomb. Calhoun looked at Adrien, lifted both hands in a stop-it gesture and simply said, "Don't.'' We can't promise he'll handle future flashpoints as calmly, knowing him as a maniacal competitor who paces the sideline, chomps gum furiously and might emasculate an official as quickly as he shouts down a political activist inquiring about his salary. "I did yell a couple things out,'' he said to laughter in the media room. "My wife will tell me about them later.''

But it was good to see the rascal have an easy afternoon Saturday. Because too much of his life has been utter hell.

As anyone with a pen and bracket knows, Calhoun was hospitalized Thursday and missed UConn's first-round derailing of Chattanooga. This was major news, in that the Hall of Famer's ongoing health problems have become one of college basketball's bigger stories. It was the third time he has missed an NCAA tournament game, the 21st time he has missed a game in his career. Last spring, he battled cancer for the second time, undergoing surgery to remove a lump in his neck and following up with radiation treatments. Six years ago, he battled prostate cancer. A season doesn't pass without something attacking the man's soul, such as the stress and exhaustion that forced him away last season and the shingles that got him in January. This time, fortunately, doctors here said he was nothing more than dehydrated and gave him a clean bill of health after a full-blown examination and overnight hospital stay.

"I started bargaining with them to get out of there as quickly as I could, using tickets and anything I possibly could,'' said Calhoun, joking about his doctors and nurses. "T-shirts being sent to their children, their next of kin -- anything I could do to get out of there early ... But bottom line is that (when wearing a hospital) bracelet, unless you can whip up on a couple security guards, you're not going anyplace. And I wasn't going anyplace.

"Quite frankly, I feel good now. I didn't realize I was that healthy. But I'll preface that by saying no psychiatric tests were taken. So keep that in mind.''

At 66, in a demanding profession that tortures the body and mind, Calhoun knows he must be especially careful. Coaches are still stunned by the death of Wake Forest colleague Skip Prosser, who died of a heart attack in his office two years ago after going for a jog. When Calhoun was a teen, his father died of a heart attack, forcing a 15-year-old to help take care of a large family that included five siblings. There are people in the game who root for Calhoun to win his third national championship, or at least reach the Final Four, so he can retire on top with his health intact.

Good luck with the retiring part.


"It isn't like it happens every single day,'' said Calhoun, who pointed out that he has coached 1,144 games. "I haven't had a great run over the last year, at least it seems, from cancer to shingles to this, although this was not an illness really -- it was something where I didn't feel well. I've been there for most of the games (in his
career). Missed a few. Some of those, obviously, were for prostate cancer.''

And it's not like Coach Type A is going to downshift his intensity at this point in life. "On occasion, the (players) tell me I'm a little bit high strung and nervous. I say, there's a guy named Bill Russell who threw up before every game,'' Calhoun said. "He turned out OK, the greatest winner ever. There is no game that I've ever approached that I don't feel that in my stomach, OK?

"I've been in national championship games. I've been in a lot of different kinds of situations. I've always probably been stressed in every single game. As a matter of fact, the only thing I shared with Russell, as a player, is the fact there was never a game where I didn't feel really, really ready to go before the game. I mean, really ready to go. The point being, it's a natural inclination of mine. I've had players ask me the same thing. I've had people I've become friendly with who are actors, public speakers. Do you get kind of a rush? Everybody handles it differently. Everybody's body handles it differently.''

Has anyone tried to advise him? "I don't know of any tip -- except maybe not coach basketball, not doing something competitive,'' he said. "But whatever it is, I'll find a reason to make it competitive. You know what I'm saying? Reading a book? I'd see if I could do it the fastest of anybody who's ever read a book. Point being, that's my nature. A woman (reporter) asked me very nicely earlier, 'Are you type A?' What's beyond that? That's a trick question, I know.''

Motivated by Calhoun's health situation, the Huskies have ripped their first two opponents by a combined 82 points. That ties the 1999 Duke team for the most decisive results in an opening weekend -- the same Duke team that UConn beat for Calhoun's first national championship. Want more potential karma? In '99 and 2004, Calhoun had to miss NCAA tournament games. Both years, UConn won national titles.

Hmmm.

"I didn't know that,'' said Hasheem Thabeet, the 7-3 center. "That's very interesting to know.''

"Maybe it's an omen or something. Hopefully, it is,'' Calhoun said. "It doesn't seem that my body picks its spots.''

The players clearly respect this man. They had no doubt he'd be back for the second round. "He's just fought through so many things in his life. A little sickness wouldn't prevent him from coaching,'' said Adrien, who had 23 points and eight rebounds. "He's a fighter, and basically, that's who we are. He pushes us to go to the next level, to go higher and expect more and more from ourselves, because that's what he does. He expects that out of himself. He's going to keep on fighting, so we're going to keep on fighting."

"He definitely does rub off on us,'' said A.J. Price, who had 27 points for a team that shot 58 percent against defensively challenged A&M. "If you're not tough, a tough person mentally, you couldn't play under coach Calhoun. That's the only way I can really put it. His toughness carries over to us. It translates from practice to game time.''

Without injured guard Jerome Dyson, UConn has slipped in some eyes as a serious March player. But those who doubted the team's resilience after its six-overtime loss to Syracuse last week now are rethinking positions. Thabeet gives them a shot-blocking element unlike any in the college game. Price and Adrien are big-time players. They're still the No. 1 seed in the West Region, and they're still on a collision course to play maligned and angry Memphis in the regional final in an Arizona football stadium. For now, Calhoun is thrilled to see his team playing so well.

"This is kind of a nice moment for me. This team brought me a great deal of joy,'' he said. "I truly believe that they're really, really focused on being the best they can be. It was not a game where I had to get them going. They were very focused on their own. They came in really with a purpose. I don't think it's a chip, but it's a purpose, no question.''


It was a home game for coach Jay Wright, just as it was Thursday in a tense win over American University. The navy-clad fans were rocking and screaming, creating a rare partisan edge in an event built on impartiality in the stands. The old 1985 miracle-maker, Rollie Massimino, sat behind the bench in what felt like a Philly love-in. I was waiting for Rocky to show up. Villanova has played more than 40 games in the home arena of the Philadelphia 76ers and Flyers, usually against major Big East rivals, and the players know the nuances of the Wachovia. "It's the way the NCAA set it up, and I wouldn't argue with you," Wright said. "I'd rather play here than play in California, there's no doubt in my mind. There are advantages to being home."

"When the crowd kicks in here, you can just feel the energy," said Villanova's Dante Cunningham, who scored 18. "It helps take your game to another level."

"They're always loud, very into the game for the entire game,'' teammate Dwayne Anderson. "It definitely helped us.''

That's a problem. Why should Villanova have such an advantage when 64 other teams in the NCAA tournament do not? It's one thing for North Carolina and Duke to play an hour from their campuses in Greensboro Coliseum, which isn't a home court for either. It's quite another to play in your "home away from home,'' as Villanova calls the arena in its media guide, and dress in your own locker room. Worse, Wright and his bosses seemed to plot the advantage when they scheduled only three games at Wachovia this season, circumventing a rule that doesn't allow an NCAA team to play in an arena where it had at least four home games in a season. They conveniently moved two games next door to the Spectrum, the old relic that soon will meet a wreckingball.

"We understand this is the only true road game in the NCAA tournament,'' UCLA coach Ben Howland said. "I think it's obviously an advantage to be in your familiar, backyard surroundings -- there's no question about that. Whether the game would have been any different if it had been played anywhere else is something we'll never know ... They know the place. They even know about the dead spots on the floor."

Well, not exactly. As Villanova's Reggie Redding pointed out, "It's actually not even the same courts. The NCAA brought their own courts in this year.''

Truth be told, UCLA delivered such a soft, wimpy performance that it probably wouldn't have mattered where the game was played. So intimidated was Darren Collison by Villanova's physicality, the UCLA point guard kept complaining to the officials. "I was talking to the official because I thought they were fouling too hard," Collison said. "They were a physical team. It's nothing we haven't seen in the Pac-10. We've played a lot of physical teams in the Pac-10."

It comes off as West Coast whining, especially when UCLA committed 20 turnovers and was outrebounded 41-29. "I mean, if he thought we were playing rough ... We were playing our game,'' Redding said. "That's the way we play every game. He's going to the ref complaining -- we don't pride ourself on other teams going and complaining to the ref. We saw it, just kept coming at them. I think we won the battle.''

Still, this was a sham that clearly helped Villanova, a Big East team that needs no help. By halftime, the fans streamed out of the building, leaving thousands of empty seats for UConn and Texas A&M, which also was unfair.

Not that Jim Calhoun cared. He was happy, healthy and coaching again.

But he must be careful. The next hospital visit might not be as kind.