College Basketball / Robyn Norwood : This Attendance Record May Need an Asterisk

If you find it surprising that Louisiana State and Georgetown are likely to set a National Collegiate Athletic Assn. attendance record when they play in the Louisiana Superdome today, you are not alone.

Granted, it is a game with appeal. Second-ranked Georgetown against LSU and its remarkable freshman, Chris Jackson. John Thompson vs. Dale Brown.

But 65,913 people?

That’s the number of tickets that had been distributed as of late this week.

The catch: 45,000 of those tickets were bought at a reduced price by a shoe store and a bottled water company--and then given away. The school also gave away several thousand to students.

It’s all part of a plan by Brown to break NCAA attendance records.

The first goal was to break the regular-season record of 52,693 set in the game between UCLA and Houston at the Astrodome in 1968. Elvin Hayes led Houston to a 71-69 victory over UCLA, which was led, of course, by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, then known as Lew Alcindor.

With that mark seemingly assured, Brown’s sights have turned toward the mark of 64,959, set by Indiana and Syracuse in the Superdome in the 1987 NCAA championship game.

The Superdome usually announces turnstile attendance, which in this case might be considerably lower than tickets distributed.

For NCAA purposes, the figure is paid attendance plus media attendance. And paid attendance includes every ticket sold--no matter for how little, and no matter if it was ultimately given away.

Kohn Smith, the first-year coach at Utah State, is not making friends with other Big West Conference coaches.

Before Nevada Las Vegas’ 94-68 victory over Utah State Wednesday night in Logan, Utah, several newspapers reported Smith as having said that he was happy to see UNLV lose to Louisville. He also questioned the character of the UNLV program.

“Let’s take a polygraph test and ask every one of our players if they were recruited legally, if ever they were given inducements or given anything illegally by boosters,” the Associated Press reported Smith as having said.

“It’s hard for me to walk out of the tunnel at Las Vegas, stand there as our kids get into cabs and see (Stacey) Augmon and (David) Butler come out and get into big, fancy cars. . . . It’s hard to see them with the alligator shoes, the jewelry, the whole business and not wonder about it.”

UNLV’s Jerry Tarkanian and Smith had a heated exchange after the game, an AP story said.

“I wanted to be your friend,” Tarkanian said.

“Sure you did,” Smith responded.

“I did, but I don’t anymore,” Tarkanian said, loud enough to be heard by spectators.

Afterward, Tarkanian vented his anger.

“We always pull for teams in our conference when they play outside the conference,” Tarkanian said. Tarkanian was highly critical of Smith’s statements.

“I resent greatly what I thought were comments that had racial overtones and were the most classless I have ever heard from a basketball coach,” Tarkanian said. “It’s his first year of coaching, and he ought to win some games before he talks.”

Smith defended his statements and denied making any racist remarks, but Tarkanian indicated he won’t be putting the incident aside.

“Our goal from here on will be to play our 2 best games of the year against Utah State,” Tarkanian said. “We will dedicate ourselves to having our best games each year against the Aggies.”

Smith also drew a response from Coach John Sneed of Cal State Fullerton this week after suggesting that the Aggies had lost to Fullerton in 4,000-seat Titan Gym last Saturday because of a letdown after playing in front of 18,000 in UNLV’s Thomas and Mack Center 2 days earlier.

“To me, that was really bush,” Sneed said.

College Basketball Notes

Guard Gary Payton of Oregon State took some publicity away from Arizona’s Sean Elliott and Stanford’s Todd Lichti with his performance last week, scoring 60 points in 2 victories, adding 15 assists and 5 steals. Going into this week’s games, Payton was leading the Pacific 10 in scoring, 22.8 points, assists, 7.9, and steals, 3.8. . . . The 10 players who walked out on San Jose State Coach Bill Berry last week, accusing him of verbal abuse and demanding that he be fired, have been holding their own practices at an outdoor court in the apartment complex in which senior Anthony Perry lives. Despite learning that their scholarships will not be revoked, the players remain in consultation with San Francisco attorney Melvin Belli and still hope that Berry will be fired or resign, Perry said.