The Difference Is Knight and a Vocabulary

Steve Alford, who helped Bob Knight’s Indiana Hoosiers to an NCAA basketball title in 1987, was recently hired as coach at Southwest Missouri State. He said his coaching style is a blend of four major influences in his life:

His father, Sam Alford, a top high school coach in Indiana; Knight; and his two NBA coaches--John MacLeod and Don Nelson.

Alford said jokingly that there was one major difference between himself and Knight: “He’s got a much broader vocabulary than I have.”

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Trivia time: What school holds the NCAA basketball championship game record for most points?

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Full house: Tubby Smith, Georgia’s new basketball coach, whose given name is Orlando, was nicknamed Tubby by his mother because he was fond of the bathtub.

“Coming from a family of 17 kids, you don’t get a chance to get in the tub very often,” he said.

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Get earmuffs: Dave Segui, New York Met first baseman, on replacement baseball: “It’s like if you went to New York for an opera expecting Pavarotti and the curtain opens and Roseanne is sitting there.”

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Relocation humor: Jay Zygmunt, senior vice president of the Rams, in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch on allegations that the the front office purposely mismanaged the team to facilitate a move to St. Louis:

“We’re looking at drafting the worst player available.”

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Door by a TKO: Kevin Paul Dupont of the Boston Globe reports that Dallas goalie Darcy Wakaluk will be out at least a couple of weeks after breaking his right hand on the bathroom door at Joe Louis Arena in Detroit.

“If you’re going to throw a right hand, there’s probably no better place than Joe Louis,” Dupont writes.

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Net controversy: Blackie Sherrod in the Dallas Morning News: “Loudspeaker Dick Vitale sez he’s addicted to tennis, that he plays every day he isn’t busy yelling basketball philosophy into a mike. Tennis is said to be preparing a denial.”

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Why not? Peter Vecsey in the New York Post on Michael Jordan’s outstanding performance against the Knicks last Tuesday:

“Chicago fans were so impressed that they want the state’s speed limit changed to 55 points per Jordan.”

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Off base: Bob Smizik in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: “Speaking to television cameras the other day, Boston Red Sox pitcher Roger Clemens said, ‘We want to get out there and play baseball even though the owners won’t let us do that.’

“Hey, Roger, it’s a strike not a lockout! You’re the guys who walked away from the game.”

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FYI: During the 1940s, Dick Kazmeier, Princeton’s 1951 Heisman Trophy winner, won 17 letters in four years at Maumee (Ohio) High--four each in football, basketball, baseball and track. He also earned a letter in golf.

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Trivia answer: Nevada Las Vegas with 103 against Duke in 1990.

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Quotebook: Pitcher Dave Cole, after being told he had been sold to the Philadelphia Phillies in the 1950s: “That’s too bad. They’re the only team I can beat.”