No More Midnight (U)Mass for Them Nowadays

Julius Erving played basketball for the University of Massachusetts, before it became fashionable. Those were the days when a blue-chip recruit would be no more inclined to visit UMass than he would the Yukon, the nights when the Minutemen would have agreed to play at any hour, even 3 a.m. opposite some horror movie, if only some local television station would ask.

Years later, after a young, ambitious John Calipari “took a job no one else wanted,” the all-sports TV network finally called.

“We’d like to do your game.”

“Great,” the UMass coach said.

“But we’d like to do it late.”

“How late?” Calipari asked.

“Midnight.”

That surprised the coach.

“A West Coast game?” he asked.

“No.”

“Oh, you mean tape-delayed.”

“No.”

That confused the coach.

“What night of the week?” he asked.

“Saturday.”

Calipari made a coaching decision. “Oh, Saturday,” he said. “OK.”

The opponents were not exactly powers. Manhattan. Southwestern Louisiana. But that didn’t matter to Calipari. Exposure was exposure. He had taken over the Massachusetts program in 1988, at the tender age of 31. All anybody seemed to know was that Doctor J had done his pre-doctorate work there.

There was no UMass appeal.

“We couldn’t be a conventional school,” Calipari said. “We had to be unconventional, because we were behind the eight-ball. Lucky for us, the midnight thing grew into kind of a cult thing on campus. We began to find an audience.

“Up to then, nobody much good would schedule us. Or they would only play us at home. And nobody wanted to play for UMass, either. The kids, they ask and they ask: ‘How many times will you be on TV?’ ‘How many times will you be on TV?’

“And I’d go like this. . . .”

Calipari cupped a palm over his mouth.

He mumbled, unintelligibly: “Wnce, n SptsChnnl.”

(“Once, on SportsChannel.”)

Preening like a larger network’s peacock, as he rehearsed Friday for a game that could carry Massachusetts to the Final Four for the first time, Calipari, now coach of one of America’s strongest programs, couldn’t resist a chance to crow: “Now, we’re on 35 times.”

Today’s game is at 3 p.m., Pacific time--no more Saturday midnights for UMass.

“This is the game everyone wants to see,” bragged Calipari, in whom shyness is not evident. “UMass and Georgetown, two of the best, and I’m not afraid to say it, two of the four best teams in the country. And one of them won’t be going to the Final Four.”

For five consecutive seasons, the Minutemen have made it to the NCAA tournament. Young enough to be John Wooden’s grandson, Calipari, 37, was yearning to play UCLA in last year’s semifinals when only Oklahoma State stood in his way.

He was primed for prime time.

“We were up five on Oke State, and we just caved in.

“I remember halftime. We’re in the locker room. I tell my guys, ‘Don’t worry. We’re going to Seattle.’ I tell them, ‘Don’t worry. We’re winning. And we’re not shooting 29% in the second half, like we did the first half.

“And I was right. We didn’t.

“We shot 26%.”

Calipari tells guys lots of things. Occasionally, guys tell him things back. One night earlier this season, the coach grew so exasperated with his players that he turned to press row and asked: “Why don’t they listen?”

His best player overheard. Marcus Camby said: “Hey, relax. We’ll win the game, man.”

The players seem aware that Calipari is not a Generation X-and-O coach who demands a yes-sir, no-sir mentality from the Minutemen every minute. A senior forward, Dana Dingle, says of the coach: “He keeps us off-balance. Every day, he finds some new line or new speech, from John Wooden or somebody, to get us going. He’s always up to something.”

At the same time, it was Calipari who insisted on riding in the ambulance with Camby after the player collapsed Jan. 14 before a game. It was also Calipari who made the UMass team accompany him to a hospital here Friday, to visit a Boston University hockey player who had been flown to Atlanta after suffering paralysis from an on-ice accident.

He wants his guys to appreciate how lucky they are.

“You can’t be cool your whole life and be admired,” Calipari said. “Be a nice person. Count your blessings. My dad, he’s here with me this week, he sees the suite I’m staying in and he says, ‘Son, I don’t know what you’re doing, but keep fooling ‘em.’ My dad made $16,000 a year. My mom worked in a cafeteria. My high school coach sees me now, he just laughs.

“This isn’t some life-or-death thing, basketball. The reality today is, we’re still UMass, we’ve never won a national championship, never been to a Final Four. But it is not us against the world. I think it’s sad when people feel that way.”