A Basketball Historian Makes USC History

Harold Miner watches the little guy in the black-and-white movie, weaving in and out, in and out, dribbling and driving, dribbling and driving.

“Bob Cousy always kept his teammates happy. That was his specialty. And he was never satisfied. Cousy always tried to elevate his game to another level. I try to incorporate that into my own style of play.”

And now Miner watches a taller guy in another old movie, working over a defender, making his move, making his shot, making his man look bad.

“Oscar Robertson, now he was a consummate basketball player. Watch him back the guy guarding him toward the basket, use his body and his strength to his complete advantage. I’m built more like Oscar. I’d like to be more like him.”

Miner pops still another cassette into his VCR. He watches poetry in motion. He watches an artist at work. He watches Julius Erving.

“Now with Doctor J, it was more like ballet. It was grace and style. He turned basketball into an art form. Everything Julius Erving did on that court was a thing of beauty.”

And finally the films are in living color and current and hi-fi’d and Dolby’d. And the star of the show is a guy from Chicago, a guy with his tongue hanging out, a guy who makes other guys’ jaws drop. And this guy looks amazingly like Harold Miner, only older.

“Michael Jordan? Well, the only word that I can think of to describe Michael is greatness . You know, people try to compare me to Michael, and I just laugh and laugh at that. I’m no Michael, no way, no how. God, well, He doesn’t make too many Michaels.”

Harold Miner, 19, already has become something of a basketball historian. He is a student of the game, this USC sophomore who has developed into one of the nation’s top scorers. He raids the video stores and book shops, checking out every videotape or volume that has anything to do with basketball, past or present, from Naismith to Dean Smith.

In this respect, Miner is much like Mike Tyson, who even in his teens had committed to memory details and facts from the fights of Jack Dempsey, Gene Tunney, Joe Louis, Rocky Marciano, Muhammad Ali and others before and after. Miner studies basketball players like homework, oldies and newies. He’s different from other guys his age who wouldn’t know Bob Cousy from Bing Crosby.

Has it paid off? Well, it hasn’t hurt. Miner almost certainly will break John Block’s quarter-century old USC record for points in a season. Already this season, the 6-foot-5 guard has lit up Notre Dame for 35 points and nine rebounds, made Digger Phelps regret not landing him as a recruit and moved Dick Vitale to refer to Miner as “the best thing to happen to USC since football.”

He keeps playing the way he’s playing, some day they’ll make movies about him.

With George Raveling’s Trojans only now venturing into the taller weeds of their schedule, beginning Wednesday night at UCLA, Miner has become the Pac-10’s player to watch, the conference’s leading returning scorer from last season. He is building a Miner cult following. A fan club. Harold examiners?

His nickname is Baby Jordan. Like Michael, he shaves his head, rubs his fingers together like a dice shooter, floats to the hoop with his tongue in a droop. He says he sometimes has dreams at night in which he leaps for a dunk from the free-throw line and jams the ball through the basket backward.

Miner is so infatuated with Michael that he thought about enrolling at North Carolina, just for a shared experience. Even his number is 23. Harold identifies with him so, he probably pours Diet Coke over his Wheaties.

Also like Jordan, however, Miner would sacrifice some of his personal success if only USC could establish itself as more of a force in college basketball, after having losing records over five consecutive seasons. The Trojans were 49-95 during that span.

He could lead them out of the hoop wilderness.

“I think Miner is one of the best players in the country,” Phelps said after Notre Dame’s 105-95 loss to USC at South Bend, Ind. “We really wanted him here, and you can see why. He’s going to be one of the greatest scorers the game has seen.”

Funny thing about Miner picking USC: One of the main reasons he did so was to play closer to his family in Inglewood. Then his father, Melvin Miner, a computer programmer for IBM, was transferred to Colorado. So, when Harold scored 24 points in USC’s 74-67 victory on Dec. 8 at Colorado State, it was the first chance his father had to see him play in a collegiate game.

Meanwhile, attendance is growing at USC home games, as both Miner and the team get better and better.

No matter who is out there watching him, Miner is a performer suitable for children or adults. He is a sensation with the critics, even if he is not yet big box office, and we definitely give him thumbs up.

“Hey, it doesn’t matter if it’s a hundred people,” Miner said. “When Doctor J was playing at Massachusetts, he was always playing in front of empty crowds.”