COLLEGE DIVISION NOTEBOOK / MARTIN BECK : Chapman Takes On Towering Task at LSU

After losing its first two road games of the season, the Chapman College men’s basketball team faces its biggest challenge of the season tonight: playing at Louisiana State.

But Chapman Coach Bob Boyd said he is more concerned with preparing his team for upcoming California Collegiate Athletic Assn. competition than worrying about how the team will fare against the Tigers, ranked 18th in the nation among Division I teams.

In the pre-shot clock era, an overmatched team could help its chances of winning with a delay game, Boyd said.

“You’d have to somehow keep the ball to where the game was shortened into a three-minute game, but the rules won’t allow that,” he said.

The obvious matchup problem for Chapman, which plays McNeese State on Saturday during the two-game trip, is at center. LSU is led by 7-foot-1 center Shaquille O’Neal, who is averaging 26 points and 14.7 rebounds and might be the top post player in nation. The Panthers (3-2) don’t have a true post player. Frantz Reyes, at 6-6 the tallest Chapman starter, will guard O’Neal with a lot of help from his friends.

“We’re not a pro team so we don’t have to play (strictly) man-on-man,” Boyd said. “He’ll get as much support as we can give him without giving an unmolested shot to another player.”

Trivia: LSU is the first NCAA Division I team Chapman has played since defeating Southern Utah State, 102-87, in the 1987-88 season. The Panthers were 7-10 against Division I teams in the 1980s. In five seasons as coach at Mississippi State, Boyd was 2-8 against LSU. The only time one of his teams played McNeese State, it lost, 76-67, in 1985.

When Boyd was coaching at USC in the early 1970s, he was offered the LSU job. Boyd declined but recommended his friend, Dale Brown, who was an assistant at Washington State.

Saturday night when Boyd takes his team to St. Charles, La., to play McNeese State, LSU will play host to No. 2-ranked Arizona. And LSU Coach Brown will step onto the same basketball court with Arizona Coach Lute Olson for the first time since the two played against each other in the 1952 North Dakota state high school championship. That night, Grand Forks, with Olson at center, defeated St. Leo’s, with Brown at forward, 52-44.

“It’s kind of like reunion weekend here,” said Kent Lowe, an assistant sports information director at LSU. “It’s like the clocks are turning backward.”

Big Cheeses: The Southern California College men’s basketball team defeated Central Methodist, 123-118, Saturday to win the championship of the Big Cheese Pioneer Classic, a tournament sponsored by a local pizza parlor at Mid-America Nazarene College in Olathe, Kan.

“We didn’t even get a Big Cheese pizza but we got a nice big trophy for a little tournament,” SCC Coach Bill Reynolds said.

The Vanguards, who were 6-2 and had been averaging 93.7 points a game entering Thursday’s game with Christian Heritage, had a successful trip to the Midwest, losing only to Division I Missouri Kansas City, 88-69, last Thursday.

Reynolds said he was encouraged by the way his team played against Central Methodist, an NAIA school in Fayette, Mo., but said it needs to solidify its defense and rebounding to do well against competition in the Golden State Athletic Conference and District 3.

Panther Postscript: West Texas State, which defeated Chapman in the first round of the NCAA Division II women’s volleyball playoffs, swept to the NCAA championship last weekend at Cal State Bakersfield. The No. 1-seeded Buffaloes, who finished the season 38-1, defeated North Dakota State, 15-0, 15-5, 15-3, in the title match and won its three matches in three games.

Chapman, which will return five of its six starters next season, was the only team to win a game against West Texas State in the playoffs.

College Division Notes

Southern California College baseball Coach Charlie Phillips will hold a clinic for baseball players ages 8 to 17, Dec. 27-29. The camp, which will include drills in hitting, fielding, catching and pitching, costs $125. For more information, call Phillips at 858-0463.