THE SEOUL GAMES / DAY 14 : Boxing : Coming Off Deck, U.S. Has Shot at 6 Golds

No one would have dared predict it 2 weeks ago, but after a sensational rally in the Olympic boxing tournament, U.S. boxers could win six gold medals Saturday and Sunday at Chamshil Students’ Gymnasium. At worst, they could win six silver medals.

They like to call themselves the red, white and blue wrecking crew, and for the most part the American boxers have pretty much been just that.

But that transpired only after:

--Featherweight Kelcie Banks, the United States’ world and Pan American Games champion, got knocked into yesterday by a little-known Dutchman, Regilio Tuur, on the second day of the tournament.

--Coach Ken Adams and assistant Hank Johnson misread a bout schedule and failed to get middleweight Anthony Hembrick to the gym on time for his first bout and he was scratched from the tournament.

--The United States was 1-2 after the first 2 days, and the president of the USA Amateur Boxing Federation, Col. Don Hull, said: “Our coaches have failed us.”

But Adams and his team regrouped, ran off winning streaks of 13 and 10, ran up a record of 31-6, put 8 boxers into the semifinals and 6 into the finals.

On Saturday and Sunday, they can eclipse the five-gold effort of “the team the stars fell on,” the 1976 team that produced Olympic champions Ray Leonard, Howard Davis, the Spinks brothers and Leo Randolph.

Here’s how the United States has positioned itself for the weekend’s gold-medal bouts:

Saturday:

106 pounds--Michael Carbajal vs. Ivailo Hristov, Bulgaria.

119--Kennedy McKinney vs. Alexander Hristov, Bulgaria.

201--Ray Mercer vs. Baik Hyun Man, South Korea.

Sunday:

156--Roy Jones vs. Park Si Hun, South Korea.

178--Andrew Maynard vs. Nourmagomed Chanavazov, Soviet Union.

201-plus--Riddick Bowe vs. Lennox Lewis, Canada.

This is a brash, confident group.

On Thursday night, after Bowe had achieved a smashing, up-off-the-deck triumph over Alexander Mirochnichenko, a giant Soviet super-heavyweight, his confidence knew no bounds.

He told reporters: “Let’s go get Lennox Lewis right now, bring him in here tonight, and settle it, so he can get his silver medal tonight.”

And heavyweight Mercer said much the same Wednesday, after he had destroyed a favored Dutch opponent, Arnold Vanderlijde.

“I ain’t afraid of the Korean, I ain’t afraid of the crowd, and I don’t hate nobody,” he said. “But nothing is going to stop me from getting that gold medal.”

And one boxer, at the end of the United States’ 6-for-8 showing in the semifinals, credited Adams, the once-embattled coach.

“You guys (reporters) pushed this guy the wrong way,” said Maynard, the light-heavyweight. “That got him mad, so he got on our case. And he’s motivated us right into the finals.”

If the U.S. Olympic Committee gave an award to the comeback coach of the Games, Adams would be tough to overlook. He has crawled out of the doghouse twice in 4 months.

For starters, he got fired and needed a lawyer to get his job back.

Adams assaulted a USA/ABF accountant, Kersten Dahl, on May 12 at the federation’s Colorado Springs headquarters. Adams was suspended for 6 months, which effectively removed him from his Olympic assignment.

Adams appealed, but the suspension was upheld in two hearings. Then his attorney appealed to the USOC, which sent the whole matter to a Denver arbitrator.

On Aug. 16, the arbitrator overturned the suspension and Adams was back in business.

Then came Seoul, and the Hembrick matter.

Adams was humiliated but publicly took the rap for the foul-up that prevented Hembrick, after years of training, from competing in the Olympics.

Adams was the butt of hundreds of jokes for a few days but, luckily for him, rampaging South Koreans took the heat off him.

On Day 6 of the tournament, South Korean boxing officials, enraged at a New Zealand referee’s decision in a bout involving one of their boxers, poured into the ring and attacked the referee.

Everyone forgot about Adams.

As Jim Fox, executive director of the USA/ABF put it: “I’m thinking of sending the South Koreans roses and a thank-you note. They got us off Page 1.”

Of the six Americans in the finals, McKinney and Jones have traveled the easiest paths.

McKinney drew the easy half of the bantamweight bracket, stopping two weak opponents in the first round, drawing a walkover on an opponents’ arm injury, and earning a 5-0 decision.

Jones, who might be on his way to the tournament’s outstanding boxer award, stopped his first opponent in Round 1, then ran up three straight 5-0 decisions.

Jones has been a masterful boxer in the tournament, with a straight, upright style and a busy jab that international judges seem to prefer, and a thumping following right hand.

But for Carbajal, the journey to the medal round wasn’t easy.

He drew his most difficult foe, South Korean Oh Kwang Soo, in the first round of the preliminaries. He pulled out an extremely difficult 3-2 decision, then had two more bouts that were only slightly less difficult, winning decisions against Canadian Scott Olson and, in the semifinals, Hungarian Robert Isaszegi.

The three heavier U.S. boxers, Maynard, Mercer and Bowe, were at first disappointing here. All three struggled against inept foes before stopping them.

Mercer seemed to at least temporarily reverse that trend with his smashing victory over the heavyweight favorite, the 6-foot 7-inch Vanderlijde of the Netherlands, in the semifinals.

And on Thursday night, Bowe, the team’s designated comic, paid tribute to his once-embattled coach after his rousing victory over 6-5, 230-pound Soviet super-heavyweight Mirochnichenko.

Bowe, who has problems in the areas of concentration and motivation, started off his bout with the Soviet like a sleepwalker.

First, Mirochnichenko hit Bowe in the ribs and Bowe went to one knee. Mirochnichenko landed another flurry and Bowe took another standing-8 count in the first round. One more and the bout would have been stopped.

Between rounds, Adams appeared angry enough to punch Bowe himself.

Bowe, 21, went to grade school with Mike Tyson, has a history of being at his best in crises, though. At the Pan American Games last summer, he was on the deck twice in a bout with Cuba’s world champion super-heavyweight, Jorge Gonzales, then had Gonzales out on his feet twice in the second round before losing.

So with this guy, getting hurt is catching a break.

After his win over the Soviet, Bowe was his usual modest self.

“It was quite embarrassing for the great one to be on the canvas,” he said.

“The reason I couldn’t let that guy beat me is because I’m too used to doing this,” he said. “I don’t want no bronze or silver medal--it would be too uncivilized.”