Jerry Tarkanian dies at 84; Hall of Fame coach at UNLV

Jerry Tarkanian, the droopy-eyed, towel-chomping college basketball coach who transformed Nevada Las Vegas into a glitzy powerhouse as he waged a decades-long war against the National Collegiate Athletic Assn., has died. He was 84.

Tarkanian died Wednesday in Las Vegas, where he had been hospitalized for breathing difficulties, his family said. He had numerous health issues in recent years.

“Our hearts are broken but filled with incredible memories,” Tarkanian’s wife, Lois, said in a statement released by the family.

Known as “Tark the Shark,” Tarkanian never had a losing record in 38 seasons, finishing 988-228 overall, with a major-college mark of 778-202. He won four California junior college state championships and four times led UNLV to the Final Four of the NCAA tournament.

“The basketball world has lost a great coach and a great mentor, someone that’s given everything to basketball and meant so much to a lot of people,” said Cal State Northridge basketball Coach Reggie Theus, who played for Tarkanian at UNLV. “It’s hard for me because I smile every time I think about him. I have so many great memories of Tark, but I’m really sad.”

Tarkanian claimed one NCAA title victory on the basketball court, with his run-and-fun UNLV team of 1990. He split two in-court cases with the NCAA, losing a 5-4 U.S. Supreme Court decision but later earning a $2.5-million settlement.

Tarkanian’s coaching talents, particularly his brilliance as a defensive tactician, were overshadowed by off-court controversies surrounding alleged recruiting violations and a wide range of other infractions that may have delayed his induction into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame until 2013.

In 1991, at the height of his success, Tarkanian abruptly announced his retirement after a Las Vegas newspaper published a photo of three of his UNLV players in a hot tub with a convicted bookmaker.

Tarkanian briefly coached the NBA’s San Antonio Spurs before returning to college in 1995 at Fresno State, his alma mater. He retired for good in 2002.

He left three major-college schools — Long Beach State, UNLV and Fresno State — in varying states of infractions disarray, but he maintained that NCAA charges were trumped up by a governing body out to get him.

He once told the Los Angeles Times: “I’ll resent them forever. That’s in my blood.”

Tarkanian vs. NCAA was the legal version of Ali vs. Frazier — two combatants exchanging blows for decades. The feud’s origins date to the early 1970s when Tarkanian, while coaching Long Beach State, penned critical columns for the local newspaper claiming the NCAA targeted smaller schools.

Tarkanian would later famously quip, “The NCAA is so upset at UCLA they’ll put Northridge on two years’ probation.”

The coach never claimed he was a saint — his problem, he said, was the hypocrisy. “In major college basketball, nine out of 10 teams break the rules … the other one is in last place,” he wrote.

The NCAA denied ever singling out Tarkanian.

“The issue of a vendetta against Jerry Tarkanian is an absolute myth,” an NCAA spokesman once said. “… Jerry Tarkanian has essentially gotten the same treatment everybody else has gotten.”

In a 1992 profile of Tarkanian for the Times Sunday magazine, Michael J. Goodman wrote: “Tarkanian has a perfect record of conceding little, admitting less, confessing nothing and denying what seems undeniable. …The person most responsible for Tarkanian’s troubles is Tarkanian.”

Tarkanian saw himself as a champion of lost causes and hard-luck cases. Slouch-shouldered, with sad-looking eyes that made him look almost forlorn, Tarkanian appealed to the downtrodden. He befriended high school coaches and wasn’t afraid to recruit after dark in the toughest neighborhoods. Low grade-point averages didn’t scare him either. He was one of the first coaches to heavily recruit African Americans out of junior colleges, and he loved transfers from major programs.

“They already have their cars paid for … I’m not kidding,” he wrote in his 2005 memoir, “Runnin’ Rebel.”

Tarkanian had spectacular hits -- Larry Johnson, the catalyst of UNLV’s national title team, was recruited out of Odessa College in West Texas — and one mind-boggling miss.

Tarkanian took his most misguided risk in the mid-‘80s on Lloyd Daniels, a troubled prodigy from New York.

“The problem with Lloyd,” Tarkanian would write, “was he had a lot of problems.”

Tarkanian overcame obstacles of his own. He was born Aug. 8, 1930, in Euclid, Ohio, the son of Armen and Rose Tarkanian, Armenians who immigrated to the United States to escape persecution from the Turks. After his father died of tuberculosis when Jerry was 10, the family moved to Pasadena.

Tarkanian played basketball at Pasadena High and Pasadena City College, earning a scholarship to Fresno State, where he was mostly a practice player and petty prankster. He met future wife Lois Huter, a member of the student court, when Jerry and accomplices were put on trial for pulling the electrical plug at a school dance.

Working summers at the National Biscuit Co. in Pasadena convinced Tarkanian he never wanted an ordinary job. He got his first job coaching basketball at Fresno’s Edison High, then moved on to San Joaquin Memorial High in Fresno and Antelope Valley High in Lancaster before landing at Redlands High — where the legend of the towel-chomp was born.

Tarkanian said it all started at a 1960 league championship game, in a sweltering gym with no air conditioning. Tired of repeated trips to the water fountain, the coach soaked a towel and used it to quench his thirst. Redlands won, and the superstitious Tarkanian continued the ritual the rest of his career.

Success at Redlands led Tarkanian to Riverside Community College, where he won three state titles in five seasons. His last three teams went 97-6, including a 35-0 season in 1963-64.

He moved on to Pasadena City College in 1966 and then, in 1968, to Long Beach State, a commuter school that enlisted Tarkanian to make basketball viable in a market dominated by UCLA and USC.

His five-year record was 116-17 — including 65-0 at home. Long Beach’s 1971 team, led by All-America Ed Ratleff, nearly upset UCLA in the NCAA West Regional finals.

Tarkanian was dubbed “Tark the Shark” by Times columnist John Hall, but he never thought he was competing in an equal tank. He claimed he lost a recruit to USC when, after the prospect’s mother complained of a toothache, USC sent a dentist to her house.

Tarkanian seethed over UCLA, which won 10 national titles in 12 seasons. He respected Coach John Wooden but thought the NCAA turned a blind eye to booster Sam Gilbert, a contractor who befriended many Bruin stars.

In his memoir, Tarkanian wrote that Gilbert put UCLA “so far over the salary cap it was ridiculous. He was the biggest cheater out there.”

In March 1973, only days after Tarkanian had accepted the UNLV job, the NCAA accused Long Beach State of dozens of violations, including improper recruiting practices and academic fraud.

Tarkanian fought back, producing affidavits from players claiming the NCAA used strong-armed tactics to coerce statements. David Berst, the NCAA’s lead investigator, was portrayed as a man obsessed with Tarkanian and even admitted referring to the coach as a “rug merchant.”

The NCAA in those days didn’t use tape recorders during interviews, relying on notes and recollections — methods that would be revised because of its handling of Tarkanian.

Tarkanian left Long Beach State on three years’ probation. In 1977, the NCAA then targeted UNLV for alleged violations, ordering Tarkanian to be suspended two seasons. He received a court injunction to remain coach while the case worked its way through the system. In 1988, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled, 5-4, against Tarkanian, saying the NCAA was a voluntary organization and that if he didn’t like the way it operated, he could quit.

Tarkanian didn’t quit. The ruling did not require him to serve his original suspension, so he continued his battle against the NCAA, while forging a basketball dynasty at UNLV. The Rebels’ success led to construction of a 19,000-seat arena, the Thomas & Mack Center, with the local glitterati convened in a section called “Gucci Row.”

Tarkanian was on the verge of becoming coach of the Lakers in 1979 when Vic Weiss, a childhood friend from Pasadena and his agent negotiating the deal, was found slain and stuffed in the back of his Rolls-Royce. Police suspected ties to organized crime, but the case remains unsolved. Tarkanian, shaken by the incident, turned down the Lakers.

His UNLV teams kept winning throughout the late ’70s and early ’80s. In 1986, though, the coach became infatuated by Daniels, whom Tarkanian said was Magic Johnson with a better jump shot.

Tarkanian tried to get Daniels academically eligible by funneling him through Mt. San Antonio College in Walnut, Calif. Assistant coach Mark Warkentien became the player’s legal guardian.

But Daniels never played a minute at UNLV after being arrested on suspicion of buying cocaine from undercover officers in Las Vegas.

After UNLV’s 1990 squad — led by Greg Anthony, Stacey Augmon, Anderson Hunt and Larry Johnson — routed Duke by 30 points to win the national title, Tarkanian insisted the banner read “national,” not “NCAA,” champions. The euphoria was short-lived after the NCAA sanctioned UNLV for violations related to Daniels’ recruitment. The team was banned from defending its national title but ultimately was permitted to defer punishment until 1991-92.

UNLV was 34-0 and riding a 45-game winning streak into the 1991 Final Four when Duke, run off the court the previous year, shocked the Runnin’ Rebels in the semifinals en route to the title.

A month later, the Las Vegas Review-Journal published the photo of UNLV players in a hot tub with Richard “the Fixer” Perry, who had been convicted of sports bribery in a point-shaving scandal involving basketball players at Boston College.

Perry had helped Daniels get to Las Vegas from New York and posted bail after Daniels’ drug bust.

Tarkanian said he didn’t know the true identity of Perry — known as Sam Perry to the athletic department — until it was revealed in 1989 by Time magazine.

Tarkanian announced he would step down after the 1991-92 basketball. His last team, banned from the NCAA tournament, finished 20-6. In 19 seasons his UNLV teams went 509-105.

The Spurs hired Tarkanian in 1992, but he lasted only 20 games before he was fired.

Tarkanian receded to a life of judging beauty contests, attending banquets, analyzing basketball games for television and pursuing his case against the NCAA.

In 1995, his alma mater, Fresno State, wooed him back. Although he led the Bulldogs to two NCAA tournament appearances in seven seasons, his last coaching stop was tainted by point-shaving accusations.

In 1998, Tarkanian won $2.5 million from the NCAA to settle his suit accusing the organization of harassment. Without any admission of wrongdoing, the settlement did include a statement from NCAA President Cedric Dempsey that read, in part, “The NCAA regrets the 26-year ongoing dispute with Jerry Tarkanian and looks forward to putting this matter to rest.”

The settlement also stated that Tarkanian’s case contributed “in a positive way” to changes in NCAA enforcement procedures.

Besides his wife, Tarkanian is survived by their children Pamela, Jodie, Danny and George; his sister, Alice; his brother, Myron, and 11 grandchildren. Danny played point guard for his father at UNLV.

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