5-2 1/2 Basketball Pro? : Lieberman Wants to Play Ball

A back injury suffered in an auto accident last December may have ended his junior season prematurely, but it didn’t strip Zach Lieberman of any of his petulance.

The 5-2 1/2 former Kennedy High star, who was the shortest player in major college basketball last season, has left U.S. International University in San Diego, hired an agent--Paul Silas--and is ready to join the pros.

This, despite career statistics that, in his own words, “stink.”

In 2 1/2 seasons at USIU, Lieberman shot 29.9% from the field, averaged 3.1 points a game and had more turnovers (171) than assists (167). The Gulls won only six of the 68 games in which he appeared.

But his dream of playing in the pros has consumed him since he was 7 years old. He slept with a basketball for 15 years, didn’t date in high school and used to practice eight hours a day.

Last year, after describing himself as a “terrible” student, he added with a laugh: “If I get a degree, I’ll lose all respect for the educational system in the United States.”

After injuring himself in the week before Christmas, Lieberman had even more time to ponder life as a regular student.

“I was sitting in class and I just wasn’t enjoying not playing,” he said. “I was getting punch drunk. Basketball is my life. I’m not going to B.S. I went to school because of basketball. I was just getting bored with the routine.”

So he quit school, went to work as executive vice president of his father’s car-care products company and took an apartment in Woodland Hills--”in case any willing girls want to come over,” he said.

Lieberman said the Washington Generals--who haven’t beaten their only opponent, the Harlem Globetrotters, in 14 years--have called him and Silas told him that several European teams have expressed interest.

What about the NBA?

“Very doubtful,” he said. “But, you know, they drafted a girl.”

Her stats, however, didn’t stink.