Matadors Find Haven on Road

Carl Holmes and Brian Heinle are making that quick trip home common of college freshmen. After a good meal and a basketball game, they gotta run.

They played high school basketball in Eugene, Ore., where Cal State Northridge is staying before its game against Oregon State tonight in Corvallis.

Heinle, a 6-foot-9 center, can reminisce about his career at Sheldon High that included three conference championships.

Holmes, a 6-1 guard and a nephew of Coach Bobby Braswell, remembers Eugene as the place he turned his life around.

Braswell holds fond memories of Eugene as well. A job offer to become an Oregon assistant coach came out of thin air in 1992 and turned into a breath of fresh air for his family.

Braswell’s wife and children grew so content living in Eugene it took a great deal of soul-searching for him to take the Northridge job last year.

Despite his being a native of Los Angeles.

Despite his being a Northridge graduate.

Despite his large circle of relatives in L.A.

“I can’t begin to describe how awesome it was living in Eugene,” Braswell said. “We were nervous about how we’d be accepted. At first we thought the people were crazy because everyone would smile and talk to us before they even knew us.

“The first night we were there, our furniture was late arriving, and a neighbor we’d never met brought over food. It was incredible. It is the most family-oriented town I’ve ever seen.”

What goes around comes around. On Wednesday night Braswell took his team to dinner at a Eugene restaurant owned by a friend.

Presumably well fed, the Matadors will try to rebound from a 97-91 loss at Arizona State against another rebuilding Pac-10 team. Oregon Sate was 7-20 last season.

Win or lose, the trip will remind Holmes of how far he’s come since visiting Braswell and his wife, Penny, in Eugene the summer before he began eighth grade.

If Eugene was refreshing for the Braswells, it was a sanctuary for Holmes, who grew up in Hawthorne not playing sports, not attending much school and not following the right track.

One summer turned into four years when the Braswells agreed to become Holmes’ legal guardians.

“Living in L.A. was tough,” Holmes said. “I didn’t have a father figure. It’s funny, you would think a kid doesn’t want to be told what to do, but I actually was happy when he told me to take care of my hygiene and look people in the eye.

“He pushed me hard in school. I didn’t have any study habits. He made me do two hours of homework every day whether I had any or not.

“He talked to me like I was his son. He always called me son. I appreciated that.”

Braswell told Holmes he needed an activity outside of school, and even though he had not played organized basketball, it was the sport he chose.

Holmes met Heinle on the eighth-grade team.

“Everybody thought that because I was from L.A. I could play,” Holmes said. “They accepted me even though I wasn’t as good as they thought.”

Braswell soon fixed that, taking Holmes to the gym for grueling one-on-one workouts late at night.

“Many nights I cried because I didn’t want to work any more,” Holmes said. “Basketball was fun, I was enjoying myself, but I hated those nights.”

Chalk one up to tough love.

By the time he graduated North Eugene High, Holmes was an honor student and an honorable mention All-American guard.

“The best thing Carl ever did was move to Eugene,” Braswell said. “He had no direction when he came to us. It showed him there are other choices out there.”

Holmes, 19, still lives with the Braswells and is like an older brother to the Braswell children, Jeffrey, 11, Christopher, 7, and Kyndal, 1.

“We go bowling or miniature golfing,” Holmes said. “My teammates ride me for hanging out with an 11-year-old and a 7-year-old, but I don’t care. That’s what I like to do.”

Holmes did not play at Arizona State, but he expects an opportunity against Oregon State.

Heinle is the Matadors’ tallest player and top freshman--he had 14 points and nine rebounds against Arizona State--and should continue to play extensively.

“Part of the reason I scheduled this game was to give Brian and Carl a chance to go back to Eugene and for me to return to an area I love and see people I care for tremendously,” Braswell said.

Eugene was the last place Braswell figured he’d live until he received a phone call five years ago from Jerry Green, a Kansas assistant he barely knew.

Green was about to become the Oregon coach.

“You have the contacts in Southern California I need,” he said to Braswell, an assistant at Long Beach State. “You are my first choice as an assistant. What do you say?”

A visit to the Oregon campus and a drive around Eugene made the decision easy.

“If not for my wife’s and my families being in Los Angeles, I wouldn’t have come back,” said Braswell, who lives in Northridge. “This is my first time living in the Valley and I’ve found it to be a wonderful place to raise a family. I’m very happy here and plan to stay here a long time.”

But the Braswells--and Holmes--will always hold a place in their hearts for Eugene.