NCAA Loses Supreme Court Bid to Move Tarkanian Suit

The NCAA, accused by Jerry Tarkanian of wrongly trying to drive him out of college basketball, has lost a Supreme Court bid to move his lawsuit out of Las Vegas to another Nevada court.

The court, without comment, Monday turned away the NCAA’s argument that it cannot get a fair trial in Las Vegas because Tarkanian is a “folk hero” there.

Tarkanian, now coach at Fresno State, was coach at UNLV from 1973 until he resigned under pressure in 1992. The NCAA was investigating the school’s basketball program at the time.

Tension between the NCAA and Tarkanian dates to the late 1970s, when the UNLV basketball program was put on two years’ probation for recruiting violations. The NCAA ordered the school to suspend Tarkanian for two years, but he got a court order blocking the action.

Tarkanian sued the NCAA but the Supreme Court threw out that case and ruled in 1988 that the athletic body acted as a private organization and not with government authority in its dealings with him.

A subsequent skirmish between Tarkanian and the NCAA reached the nation’s highest court in 1994, when the justices turned away the coach’s effort to reinstate an invalidated Nevada law that had protected him and others at UNLV accused of violating NCAA rules.

Lower courts had ruled that the Nevada law interfered too much with interstate commerce.

This appeal challenged a Nevada Supreme Court ruling that allows a lawsuit against the NCAA and two of its officials by Tarkanian and his wife, Lois, to proceed in a Clark County court.

NCAA lawyers said not transferring the case to a state court outside Las Vegas violates the association’s right to an impartial jury.

“The depth and magnitude of the bias and prejudice are the result of the community’s 25-year love affair with Tarkanian,” the appeal said. “The prejudice against the NCAA is the result of Tarkanian’s skirmishes with the rules governing the eligibility and financial aid of his student-athletes.”

Lawyers for Tarkanian urged the justices to reject the appeal.

“The facts show that any publicity regarding this suit has not only diminished, it has literally disappeared,” they said.

Winter Sports

Alpine skier Christian Jagge of Finland, a former Olympic champion, won a men’s World Cup slalom with two faultless runs through a heavy snowfall and under floodlights at Sestriere, Italy. Finishing in 1 minute 51.43, he beat Austrian Thomas Sykora by 0.34 of a second. Alberto Tomba of Italy rallied from 20th to fourth place, living up to his tradition of producing strong second runs.

Soccer

Uruguay (2-0) became the first nation to clinch a spot in the semifinals of the FIFA Confederations Cup at Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, beating the Czech Republic, 2-1.

The Czechs are 0-1-1.

In another game, Hassan Soheil scored 40 seconds into the game as the United Arab Emirates (1-1) beat South Africa, 1-0, dropping the South Africans to (0-1-1).

Jurisprudence

With the future of Italian auto racing in the balance, a judge will rule today in the manslaughter trial stemming from the 1994 death of Formula One champion driver Ayrton Senna.

The decision is scheduled a year to the day after team owner Frank Williams and five others were ordered to stand trial.

Judge Antonio Costanzo is expected to grant prosecutor Maurizio Passarani’s request to acquit Williams--whose team has dominated Formula One in recent years--and three officials of the San Marino Grand Prix. Senna was killed in that race May 1, 1994.

Passarani has also asked the court to hand down one-year suspended sentences for the two other defendants, Williams-Renault technical director Patrick Head and former team designer Adrian Newey.

The prosecutor contends Head and Newey were to blame for a badly modified steering column in the Williams-Renault driven by Senna, the three-time Formula One champion from Brazil who suffered fatal head injuries when his car smashed into a concrete wall in the initial laps of the San Marino Grand Prix at Imola, Italy.

This is the first time Formula One executives have been brought to trial in Europe for a racing accident. The sanctioning body fears an unfavorable ruling will inhibit racers from competing in Italy.

Names in the News

Former North Carolina Coach Dean Smith, who became college basketball’s winningest coach in 1997 and then retired six months later, will be named sportsman of the year today by Sports Illustrated.

The death of a University of Michigan wrestler last week was caused by excessive training while trying to lose too much weight too fast, according to autopsy results. Jeff Reese, 21, was engaged in a two-hour workout in a 92-degree room dressed in a rubberized suit when he collapsed Dec. 9 in Ann Arbor and later died.

Peter Bruce Fischer, a Bellflower pediatrician who coached tennis player Pete Sampras as a youngster, pleaded guilty to sexual molestation charges involving young male patients. Fischer, 56, of Rolling Hills, faces up to six years behind bars for each of the two counts. Sentencing is set for Feb. 3 in Norwalk Superior Court.