Scoring Leaders Say They Have No Regrets

Wayne Carlander never made it to the NBA, but he has no regrets.

The leading scorer in USC history with 1,524 in 116 games, Carlander was voted the Pacific 10 Conference player of the year in 1985 after leading the Trojans to the conference title. Ronnie Coleman could break that record tonight if he scores 30 points against UCLA.

A 6-foot-8, 220-pound forward, Carlander was drafted by the Clippers in 1985 but chose to play in Spain, where he spent two seasons. After returning to Southern California, he became a mortgage banker in Garden Grove.

Married and the father of two children, Carlander, 27, didn’t want to leave his family and play in the Continental Basketball Assn., a sometime steppingstone to the NBA.

John Rudometkin, a 6-6 1/2 forward who held the USC scoring mark of 1,484 points for 23 seasons until Carlander passed him, played three seasons in the NBA before his career was cut short by cancer in 1965.

The 10th player selected in the 1962 NBA draft, Rudometkin spent three seasons with the New York Knicks before he was released and joined the San Francisco Warriors. Then the cancer struck.

Now a successful real estate investor, Rudometkin, 50, lives on an 11-acre spread in Newcastle, on the western slope of the Sierra Nevada mountains 30 miles east of Sacramento.He says he doesn’t miss basketball.

“Our home was destroyed in a fire 13 years ago and all my old trophies were destroyed,” he said. “I had guys calling me saying they could replace all those trophies. But when you go through a life-and-death experience (fighting cancer), those kinds of things aren’t important.”