COLLEGE DIVISION : La Verne Tries to Keep Going After Tragedy

The University of La Verne basketball team is off to one of its best starts ever at 7-2, but the won-loss record has taken a back seat in importance.

The team has been trying to come to grips with its emotions in the aftermath of an automobile accident Nov. 26, which left one of its players dead and another seriously injured.

Coach Gary Stewart said: “We haven’t played very well, quite frankly, since the accident and there’s a lot of things that go into that. There’s definitely some air that’s come out of the balloon. We’re just trying to take it on a day-to-day basis.”

The accident occurred at a time when everything seemed to be turning around for a basketball program that had struggled to a 5-21 record the previous season.

La Verne had just defeated Occidental in the championship game of the UC San Diego tournament in La Jolla the night before the accident to run its record to 4-0.

The following morning, junior guard Jeff Schroeder and senior forward Andre Purry were seriously injured when Purry apparently lost control of his car while traveling at a high speed on a rain-soaked Pomona Freeway in Ontario.

The 21-year-old Schroeder, a passenger in the car, died as a result of massive head injuries Dec. 1 and was buried last week and Purry, 23, who suffered spinal and kidney injuries, is in serious but stable condition at Los Angeles County USC Medical Center.

Junior center Brent Earley said he and his teammates have gained strength to deal with the tragedy through meetings with school counselors.

“That’s when it sank in for me,” Earley said. “That’s when I lost it. It really hurt at first when I heard the others talk about them. But I think that helped me because I’m the type of person that holds it all inside.”

Freshman forward Matt Hatten said: “We met shortly afterwards with counselors from our school and the coach talked to us about it and we had to deal with the reality of it. It brought us closer as a team and I know that’s a bad way to do it but that’s what happened. The immediate thing that we gained from this was team unity.”

While he is adjusting to life after the accident, Earley said it is still difficult to come home at night and not see Schroeder there.

“It’s hard because I try to avoid coming home now,” he said. “When you come here alone it’s weird because the place seems empty to me. His stuff is still around. It’s still in the same place where he left it. He used to study all the time and I’d always kid him about it. I’d go out to work (at night) and he’d be in his chair studying and then when I’d wake up in the morning he’d still be in the chair studying.”

Stewart said the accident is something that is on the mind of him and his players every day.

“That’s something that you have to battle with every day,” he said. “It’s something where you go to court for practice and you expect Jeff and Andre to be there. You expect to be able to joke with them and talk about their lives and for Jeff that won’t ever happen again.”

After the accident, the team canceled its nonconference game against Dominican that was scheduled for Nov. 28 before returning to play a surprisingly close game in a 61-51 loss to Northern Arizona--an NCAA Division I team--on Nov. 30 in Flagstaff.

“It was very difficult for us to play that game but I felt we responded pretty well,” Stewart said. “We left our leading scorer and rebounder (Deshang Weaver) home as well and I felt we competed very well. We have some pretty competitive people on this team and it was a four- or six-point game until a few minutes left. I though we responded very well under the circumstances.

“After the Northern Arizona game it really set in for us. We came back home and we really had to face the situation and what Jeff and Andre’s families were going through and it hit us like a ton of bricks. Being confronted with something is one thing and having it set in is a completely different thing.”

Stewart said Schroeder, a transfer from the University of Minnesota who had a 4.0 grade-point average and was a pre-med major studying to become a doctor, was the kind of team member coaches dream about.

“A lot of times after a situation like this happens you hear a lot of things like ‘he was a great guy’ or ‘he was the nicest guy you could ever want to know’ but I really mean that about Jeff,” he said. “If I coach for 45 years I’ll never coach a more quality kid.”

Stewart said that Purry, a former All-CIF Southern Section performer at Long Beach Poly High, had to make numerous adjustments to transfer from Cal State Long Beach to La Verne.

“He’s a tremendous person,” Stewart said. “He was on scholarship at Long Beach and you know we don’t give (athletic) scholarships here. It costs a lot of money to go here and he had to make a lot of adjustments just to come here.”

The coach said the team has gathered inspiration from news that Purry underwent successful spinal surgery last week and does not have paralysis.

“We’re encouraged by what we know about his condition and the way he’s progressing,” he said.

It is also encouraging, he said, to see the response from school officials and students. To help assist the families of both Purry and Schroeder with the tremendous hospital expenses from the accident, the university has established a trust fund and has received $2,191 in donation pledges thus far.

That will help the families of the players recover financially from the accident, although the coach says the psychological wounds will take much longer to heel.

“I don’t think you ever get over something like this,” he said. “I think what we’re talking about is simply adjusting to it.”

Stewart says it certainly places the game of basketball into its proper perspective.

“It makes basketball seem a little insignificant after something like this happens,” he said. “After a tragedy like that it makes you realize that basketball is such a small part of one’s life.”

College Division Notes

David Suenram, athletic director at Cal State San Bernardino, has been appointed to the West Regional advisory committee for the 1990 NCAA Division III baseball championships. The committee, which will recommend participants for the Division II West Regional tournament, also includes coaches Jeff Henderson of Occidental, Randy Town of Claremont-Mudd-Scripps and Lyle Yates of UC San Diego. . . . Senior outside hitter Sheri Benson of UC Riverside has been named NCAA Division II player of the year in women’s volleyball. A Division II All-America selection as a junior, Benson led Riverside to a 97-27 record in four seasons at the school and the Highlanders reached the Division II quarterfinals this season. . . . Linebacker David Hodges of Occidental has been chosen to the Kodak All-America Team for College Division II players by the American College Football Coaches Assn. The 6-4 and 210 senior, who was recently named the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference defensive player of the year, led the Tigers in tackles and had three quarterback sacks.