Arizona: A Big Buildup, a Big Letdown

Arizona basketball’s quixotic quest toward the perfect season has played out so far like “The Perfect Storm”--the school that set out to make history tilting more toward shipwreck.

The team that wasn’t supposed to lose two games all season has lost two before . . . the winter solstice?

Go ahead, Kent Benson, pop that champagne cork.

The college game’s last immaculate season, Indiana’s 30-0 run in 1976, appears safe again--unless you’re ready to move your chips to Duke or Michigan State.

First, no one honestly expected Arizona to live up to the preseason hype, promulgated refreshingly enough by senior center Loren Woods, who said the Wildcats could emerge as one of college basketball’s greatest teams if everything broke right.

Instead, everything broke.

Woods all but self-inflicted his prophecy when he was suspended six games, reportedly for taking money from his high school coach.

Oops.

Arizona forged on without the 7-footer, beating No. 8 Illinois to win the Maui Invitational, after which the team embarked on the popular Maui-Los Angeles-Denver-Indianapolis connection en route to an inevitable jet-lag loss against Purdue.

Hello, travel agent.

Fast forward from bad to worse: Just as Woods was finishing his NCAA hard time, star forward Richard Jefferson was benched against St. Mary’s after it was revealed he accepted free plane tickets and NBA finals ducats from Bill “The Fixer” Walton, that scurrilous flesh-peddling street agent who has nothing better to do than to threaten the eligibility of well-meaning college athletes.

Well, perhaps not. Actually, Jefferson is a best friend, roommate and teammate of Luke Walton, son of Bill, meaning this junket wouldn’t pass the NCAA’s smell test.

Anyone who witnessed Bill Walton’s Wooden Classic diss-ertation on Steve Lavin quickly dismissed the conspiratorial notion that Walton might imperil Jefferson to benefit UCLA, his alma mater.

Walton, in fact, was terribly distraught over his involvement in Jefferson/Airplane.

“It’s the worst thing that ever happened to me,” Walton told the Arizona Daily Star.

How could you not feel for the redhead?

“I’m devastated by this,” he said. “Richard is like a son to me and I constantly tell all the guys not to put themselves in a situation where they can damage their credibility and that of their schools.”

Jefferson, appalled that accepting freebies from Luke Walton’s dad might constitute a violation, said these were precisely the ticky-tack reasons high school kids were hopscotching college and going straight to the NBA.

Arizona Coach Lute Olson seized the moral high-ground to rant:

“I think the NCAA better hear that one loudly and clearly,” Olson said. “They can intimidate coaches and schools. Once players say enough is enough, then they have a real problem. I don’t see that too far away.”

Forget that the NCAA never suspended Jefferson. He was held out by the school for precautionary reasons. In fact, the NCAA meanies cleared Jefferson less than 24 hours after Arizona filed its appeal.

Distractions aside, Arizona looked ready to right the ship last weekend at Connecticut.

Woods was back, Jefferson had been cleared and Arizona, our team of teams, would have its full complement of players for the first time since last Jan. 8.

Then, another bombshell, this one far more sobering. Olson announced late last week that he would not accompany the team to Connecticut so that he could be with his wife Bobbi, who needed a medical procedure related to ovarian cancer that was diagnosed in 1998.

Without their coach, the Wildcats still had an eight-point lead on Connecticut with three minutes left but let it slip away, losing a 71-69 decision when Woods was called for goaltending on a Tony Robertson shot with 1.8 seconds left.

It was a terrible call, on the road, by a Pacific 10 referee no less, but it did not undercut the more pressing concerns.

Woods, expected to be an enforcer inside, looked more like a weed in the wind, making only three of 12 shots as he was pushed around the lane like a push broom.

The effects of a six-game layoff?

He should hope so.

Lost in Woods’ preseason bluster was another important caveat: Woods said Arizona had to develop a killer instinct.

“We don’t have the attitude to go out and crush every opponent yet,” he said. “It’s something we can develop, yes, but right now we don’t have that attitude.”

The Wildcats need to forget about posterity and start moving their posteriors on defense.

Bottom line, this remains an immensely talented team. And let us not forget college basketball’s most important axiom: December losses don’t mean jack come March.

Arizona has plenty of time to work out the kinks, starting Saturday at Illinois in a rematch of the Maui final.

Anyone remember where Arizona finished in the Pac-10 in 1997, the year it won the NCAA championship?

Didn’t think so.

Fifth.

WHITE KNIGHT?

There is only one man who can save Nevada Las Vegas now. Hint: he has 763 career victories and recently returned from a hunting trip with the king of Spain and Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf.

Robert Montgomery Knight to the rescue?

There could be no more perfect union of disenfranchised coach and renegade program--a 24-hour, drive-in marriage made in heaven.

When Indiana fired Knight in September, we surmised he might end up at a wide-open-spaces school in the West which had fallen on hard NCAA-probation times.

Little did we know the pieces would come together so quickly.

When UNLV canned Bill Bayno on Tuesday in the wake of NCAA sanctions, the Bob Knight bells went off in our head like a three-cherries slot machine pull.

This school and that coach are crying out for each other.

The Rebels need someone who can provide safe harbor from the NCAA. The UNLV program, hit with its second NCAA probation in the last seven years, will probably receive the NCAA “death penalty” if it slips up again in the next five years.

Knight, for all his faults--and there are plenty--ran a squeaky clean program in his 29 years at Indiana and graduated his players.

Knight needs UNLV because he needs a job. Las Vegas provides Knight the facilities and recruiting base to make him an instant winner.

Knight would bring discipline to a program that could use a paddle smack.

The hiring would also be another coup for President Carol Harter and Athletic Director Charles Cavagnaro, who have reaped the rewards of former USC football coach John Robinson, who has led the Rebels to a winning record and a bowl game two years after inheriting an 0-11 team.

Knight and Robinson? Not a bad parlay for the president and her sidekick A.D.

We acknowledge Knight working for a female president could be problematic given the coach’s sordid history with Connie Chung, athletic department secretaries and flower vases, but that shouldn’t be a deal breaker.

The great thing is that Knight is available now. UNLV could hand him the program in January and allow him the balance of a season in which the program is barred from postseason play to implement his five-year plan.

Can this make any more sense?

LOOSE ENDS

“This has been a tough week for the ‘family,’ ” University of Massachusetts Coach Bruiser Flint told the Boston Globe after Tuesday night’s 82-67 loss to Connecticut.

Flint, whose job is in jeopardy after his team fell to 1-6, found out earlier in the day that Bayno had been fired. Both were assistant coaches at Massachusetts in the early 1990s under John Calipari, who now coaches at Memphis, which fell to 2-6 this week after a loss to Mississippi.

Part of Flint’s problem has been scheduling. To save rent money, Massachusetts has played 84 of its last 135 games, a whopping 62%, on the road.

Our “no quit” award goes to Florida A&M;, which outscored Florida, 5-0, in the final minute to cut what would have been an 80-point loss to 75.

Michigan (2-5) is off to its worst start since 1981-82, but word is Athletic Director Bill Martin will wait until the end of the season to make a decision on Coach Brian Ellerbe.

After a 31-point loss to Wake Forest last week, Kansas Coach Roy Williams wondered if his team was tough enough or “a bunch of pansies.” The Jayhawks answered with a nice bounce-back victory against DePaul on Tuesday. One of Williams’ flower children, center Eric Chenowith, had one point in 18 minutes against Wake Forest. Against DePaul, Chenowith had 13 points and seven rebounds.

One of the best early-season rivalry matchups in recent years has been the Queen City battle between Cincinnati and Xavier, which meet tonight at the Shoemaker Center. Last season, Xavier shocked No. 1 Cincinnati and has won three of the last four in the series.

Iowa, which finished 14-16 last season under Steve Alford, is 7-0 for the first time since 1992-93.

You’ve heard of a player being so hot he’s “unconscious?” Well, last weekend, South Florida standout forward B.B. Waldon literally was knocked out in the opening minutes against No. 25 Texas. Waldon awoke to make 10 of 14 shots from the field, finish with 27 points and lead his team to the upset win.

Alabama Coach Mike Gottfried, the former UCLA assistant, has found himself a “program” player in freshman Gerald Wallace, who has helped the Crimson Tide to a 6-0 start by averaging a Southeastern Conference-leading 20.3 points a game.