The Basketball Doctor Is Always ‘In’ : Busy Crossroads Coach Still Finds Time Help Former Players

Dave Benezra doesn’t just coach basketball. He talks it, watches it and writes about it--15 hours a day, 12 months a year.

In the fall and winter he’s the coach at Crossroads High School. In the spring and summer he’s the mentor of an all-star team composed of high school players in pursuit of basketball excellence.

In his free time, he writes for Hoop Scoop magazine under the pseudonym Ian Rockfish and also rates players for the magazine.

The 34-year-old Benezra has been coaching for 20 years, beginning in youth leagues at the Beverly Hills Lions Club, moving up as an assistant at Fairfax and St. Bernard before creating his all-star team four years ago and taking over at Crossroads.

Like most basketball fanatics, Benezra will position himself at couch edge during the college basketball season, watching game after game on ESPN and taping those he misses on his VCR. His answering machine message cheerfully tells callers: “If you can wait until after the cable basketball games to call, I’d appreciate it.”

But under the surface, Benezra is more than an ESPN-basketball-watching-junkie.

He is a winner.

Two years ago his all-star team won the 17-and-under AAU national championship. Two years ago, his first at Crossroads, his team won the CIF 1-A state championship.

Benezra says he doesn’t coach for wins or money. Those who know him describe him as a traveling basketball doctor.

“All a kid has to do is call, even if he doesn’t play for Dave, and he’ll help them,” says Josh Oppenheimer, a Benezra student and patient. “No distance is too far for him. Dave probably drives over 600 miles a week all over California to work with kids on their basketball skills.”

Oppenheimer, a former standout at Notre Dame High in Sherman Oaks who played on Benezra’s all-star team, recently completed his freshman year at Rhode Island University. He still calls Benezra for advice on his game.

Once anyone starts talking basketball with Benezra, it’s difficult to stop, according to South Torrance High Coach Doug Mitchell.

“It’s hard to leave a gym after entering it with him because he will talk basketball endlessly,” said Mitchell, who coached with Benezra on the national championship team and frequently plays pickup games with him. “It’s even harder to get in touch with Benezra on the phone because it’s clogged with basketball callers.

“It’s amazing. I’ve been at his apartment and his phone rings non-stop. He’s had poor kids call him collect who can’t afford to make a phone call, and he helps them all. College coaches call him to find out how good different players in the West are.”

All that is needed for Benezra to try to cure a player’s problems is a tank of gas and a trunk of basketballs. Sports Illustrated pictured Benezra lying in his basketball-filled trunk two years ago in a story on college recruiting.

“When I get a player alone, just me and him driving to a park to practice basketball, talking the game along the way, that’s when I can really help a player,” Benezra said. “Most of the kids I work with are highly talented and average over 20 points a game in high school, but there are still many things they are doing fundamentally wrong, things they can get away with in high school but won’t be able to at the college level.

“Some have big egos, so it’s easiest to change those bad habits when it’s just you and a kid alone.”

The car rides, Oppenheimer said, can also be torture on the psyche.

“He will take you on a far-off drive, isolate you and tell it like it is. I was getting letters from college recruiters every day, but Dave would tell me I couldn’t play in college, that I couldn’t play defense.

“I was cocky and Dave breaks you and your pretensions down and then shows you how to improve. He could easily coach in college but he likes helping kids reach college.”

Helping kids reach college is his cause.

He proudly rattles off names of players he’s worked with: Scott Williams of Hacienda Heights Wilson, now at North Carolina; Kevin Holland of Cerritos and DePaul, Earl Duncan of St. Monica and Syracuse, Marc Rudolph of Crossroads and Brown, Steve Florentine of Redondo Beach High and UC Irvine and Oppenheimer, now at Rhode Island.

Those, of course, are players many teams want, but finding a place--the right place--for less talented players isn’t so easy.

“I had 11 seniors last year to try to locate and place at a good college that fits their needs,” Benezra said. “It took until the middle of July. That is a full-time job in itself.”

His current all-star team practices on Saturdays and Sundays and will compete in the Long Beach Slam ‘n’ Jam Tournament on July 18-23 and the Las Vegas Tournament on July 24-30. Both lure college coaches from across the country. His top players include Juno Armstrong (St. Bernard), Johnny Turrell (Inglewood), David Mitchell (Long Beach Jordan) and Andre Miller (Lakewood).

In the past three years, 23 of Benezra’s players from his all-star and high school teams have received scholarships to a four-year university, with 21 going to Division I schools.

“I don’t take credit for that,” Benezra said. “But through working with a player and through the contacts I have, I can elevate the possibilities of a low Division I player to high Division I.”

Some of the blue-chip players--like Williams, Duncan and Holland--are recruited by nearly every college in the nation. The experience of being recruited is emotional, and the pressures of letters arriving by the dozen, visits by college coaches and the promises can be overwhelming to a youngster.

Enter Benezra.

“A lot of these kids’ high school coaches don’t have the time or expertise to deal with college recruiters,” he said. “Or they don’t want to. So that’s where I step in. But you really shouldn’t advise kids which colleges to go to unless you know something about them.

“I make it my business to watch as many college games on TV as I can to see different teams’ style of play. That’s always a big factor a kid should consider, but doesn’t. If he’s not too fast, should he go to a running school?”

“I follow as many programs as I can and ask for articles and information packets on a school’s education program from SIDs (sports information directors), keep up with coaching changes and contact college coaches about players that would like play for them.”

Benezra feels that 90% of players sign with the wrong team because they don’t know what to look for. So he advises them, giving a player and his parents questions they should ask recruiters and coaches.

But the advising, albeit informed, has caused much controversy from West Coast coaches who feel Benezra is annually channeling the West’s top players to the East and Midwest. Coaches in those areas counter with the argument that Benezra is doing what he feels is best for the player.

“I’ve heard about the controversy, but in our contact with Dave, he just seems to care for the kids and asks questions about our program and school,” DePaul Coach Joey Meyer said.

Benezra claims he just shows kids what to look for in a college. “People claim I’m sending kids to the East Coast,” he said. “But I don’t tell kids where to go, only what to look for. The kids are the ones who will be spending four years at a particular school, not me. I don’t want that responsibility.”

Parents whose children have played for Benezra defend his actions, describing him as a coach, adviser, friend, mother and father to players.

“All of the kids love Dave,” said Laura Holland, whose son Kevin plays for DePaul. “Dave’s not just interested in getting a kid a scholarship; he’s concerned with their academic success, and I appreciate that.

“He is a father image to his players. They come over to eat dinner, go out and watch a movie. I just wonder where he gets the time he gives to them.”

Even though his motives have been questioned by Southland college coaches, Benezra will continue to advise, with no prejudice--he says--toward the West.

“It’s funny, I’ve called some (the West Coast schools) and told them, ‘I have a player interested in your school,’ but they won’t follow it up,” he said. “I think they are looking for only the superstar-type players and are miffed that I would call about anybody else.”

Perhaps the strangest thing about Benezra is that he didn’t make the team at University High. After being cut during his junior and senior years, Benezra came into his own as a player in pickup games at UCLA and Hamilton High. He did not go to college. He said he had a volleyball-basketball scholarship offer to George Williams College in Illinois, but he decided not to pursue it because he was already involved in coaching and wanted to stay in California.

Benezra watched the John Wooden UCLA teams and read many books about basketball, using what he learned with his youth teams.

Benezra got the job at Crossroads two years ago when Elliot Turret resigned after guiding the Roadrunners to the CIF Southern Section finals for six consecutive years and to two appearances in the state finals. After that, he left, saying there was nothing left to accomplish.

Enter Benezra.

Although Crossroads lost in the first round of the CIF playoffs this year, snapping a CIF record of reaching the championship game at seven years, Benezra has found a way to elevate the school’s strong basketball program. Last December, Crossroads traveled to a tournament in Owensboro, Ky., and competed against schools four and five times its size.

Crossroads, with only 420 students, has no gym. Benezra, however, hopes one will be built and that the team moves up to the 3-A division. It is moving from 1-A to 2-A playoff grouping next season.

“I want young kids to know that if they are serious about playing basketball in college then Crossroads is the place to go,” Benezra said.