Harvard Added Basketball Wins by Adding Inches

The sighs you hear around the basketball gym at Harvard-Westlake High these days are because of the size you see in it.

For the last few years, Harvard-Westlake has been a hotbed for such sports as water polo, tennis and volleyball. But football, basketball and baseball? Forget it.

Freshman twins Jason and Jarron Collins can’t do much about football or baseball, but what a difference the 6-foot-7 pair have made to the basketball team.

The Wolverines are 8-0, 2-0 in the Mission League. Really!

Harvard was 5-20, 1-13 last season, including losses in 19 of its last 21 games.

That team’s weakness? No size.

Not a problem anymore.

“It helps to have an intimidator and presence on defense and it helps to have a target in the middle on offense,” said Harvard Coach Greg Hilliard, who has never had a team start 8-0 in his 19 years as a high school mentor.

Jason is actually about 6-8. The extra inch, incidentally, is one of the few ways to tell the twins apart. He camps in the post and enjoys feeding time for 32 minutes and is averaging close to 20 points a game. Friday night’s 70-38 rout of Crespi was typical for Jason--19 points, 12 rebounds, six blocks.

Jarron, who plays more of a power forward position, prefers to face the basket. He is averaging about eight points.

“When they came and started playing over the summer, I realized they are more than just two big, oafy guys,” Wolverine senior Scott Garson said. “They come out and play varsity like it’s supposed to be played. They have no fear on the court.”

Hilliard said Jason stepped onto the court a couple of weeks ago against Chadwick and a grin crossed his face when he realized most of the Dolphin players would make nice chin rests for someone his size.

Jason scored 30 points, grabbed 21 rebounds and blocked six shots in Harvard’s 71-58 victory.

“Of course I expected that they would be good,” Hilliard said, “but I had no idea they’d take over games this early in the year.”

Yes, it’s early. Hilliard is quick to point out the Wolverines have only scratched the surface of their league schedule. They have not played Loyola, Bishop Montgomery or St. Bernard, considered the top teams in the league. Those teams will not be intimidated by a 6-8 freshman quite as easily as, say, Brentwood or Brethren Christian.

Garson, who along with the graduated J.W. Hobson virtually carried the Wolverines to those five victories last season, is worked up anyway about the future the twins will bring to Harvard basketball.

“I almost wish I was a freshman again,” he said. “These guys are going to be real exciting.”

*

So much for coaching: Burroughs’ Gary Bernardi would be the hands-down winner for area rookie football coach of the year. No contest.

Nine area teams had new coaches this season. Of those, only Bernardi effected a significant improvement in his program. The Indians were 0-10 in 1992 and 5-6 this season. On its way to a playoff berth, Burroughs upset perennial Foothill League power Canyon.

As for the other eight coaches, four took their teams to fewer wins than they had in the previous season and four finished with the same number of victories.

Besides Bernardi, the only two whose teams made the playoffs--Crescenta Valley’s Alan Eberhart and San Fernando’s Sean Blunt--coached teams that had reached the playoffs the season preceding their arrival. Crescenta Valley, in fact, advanced to the Southern Section semifinals and posted a record of 11-2 in 1992, but the Falcons were knocked out in the first round this season, finishing 8-3. Blunt’s Tigers went from 7-3-1 to 7-4.

*

Trivia time: Eisenhower, which won the Southern Section Division I championship and finished No. 2 in a national poll, had its two closest games of the season against Valley-area teams. Name them.

*

Lights, camera, action: Don’t be too surprised if you are flipping channels one afternoon and catch a glimpse of Hoover basketball Coach Kirt Kohlmeier. He seems to be on television as much as he’s on a basketball court.

Kohlmeier, also the Tornadoes’ softball coach, takes his teams to be audience members at talk shows to raise funds. Last year, he made regular appearances in the crowd on “The Tonight Show With Jay Leno.” This season, the program of choice is “Vicki,” a daytime talk show hosted by Vicki Lawrence.

Kohlmeier said his teams can make up to $300 per appearance on a show, depending on the number of players who go.

Because the viewers of “Vicki” are primarily women, Kohlmeier has to pick and choose the topics that might interest his players. His team has been to a show on plastic surgery and two on modeling, he said.

“They had Cheryl Tiegs once,” Kohlmeier said. “She was a little older than the kids expected, but I enjoyed it.”

*

Trivia answer: Eisenhower beat Hart, 15-14, during the regular season and Crespi, 7-3, in the section semifinals.