Strictly Business

The man paid his dues, coaching in the minor leagues from Tulsa to Springfield, the summer games in Venezuelan gyms. He drove his players from town to town in vans, taped their ankles before games.

Henry Bibby waited a decade for a shot at basketball’s big time. He finally got it in 1995, when USC hired him as an assistant. Months later, the head coach fired, he was asked to guide the team through the rest of the season.

Nine games. He had nine games to show what he could do.

The Trojans weren’t a bad team, hovering above .500, a hot streak away from sneaking into postseason play. But wins and losses were secondary to Bibby. His players had been through three coaches in two years and he wanted to establish order.

So he set new, tough rules. The starting center was suspended, a point guard quit and the team lost a string of games. “I’m setting it up for next year,” Bibby said.

That put his boss in a tricky spot. As athletic director, Mike Garrett needed to hire a permanent coach and was thinking more and more of keeping Bibby, if only the team would win.

“You keep losing because you’re pulling players out of games when they’re not acting right,” Garrett told him. “I know you want to set the tone for next year, but there may not be a next year.”

The losing continued as Bibby benched two more starters for missing a team meeting. Garrett recalls, only half-joking, that he pleaded with his coach to put the best players on the floor, if only for one night.

“Henry, I need you to win a game so people know you can do this,” he said. “Help me sell this, would you?”

Bibby would not budge. “I can’t let someone in the game if he’s late to practice,” he said. “I can’t do that.”

The Trojans finished the season--Bibby’s big chance--with nine consecutive losses.

*

In a city that casts its basketball coaches as Hollywood characters--John Wooden as patron saint, Phil Jackson as Zen master, Steve Lavin with slicked-back hair--Bibby fills the role of tough guy.

The 51-year-old coach, who was hired despite all those losses, has used an iron fist to remake USC. Over the last five years he has assembled a team of gritty players who are winning and, this season, chasing a berth in the NCAA tournament.

“It’s not a popularity contest for Henry,” says Bill Walton, who played with Bibby at UCLA in the early 1970s and now, as a television commentator, follows his coaching career. “That sternness is a challenge to his players. It’s the commitment to be great.”

But the attributes that drive Bibby to succeed also make him controversial. This week, he drew criticism for his treatment of nonscholarship players. On Thursday night, his season-long battle with Pacific 10 Conference officials erupted in a technical foul and a midcourt shouting match.

So the public’s perception of Bibby seems to run the gamut from admirably strict to cold-hearted, from principled to tyrannical, a debate that extends beyond the game. There have been stories of his bitter divorce and strained relations with son Mike, an NBA player. A national publication recently referred to him as one of the nation’s smartest but “least-loved” coaches.

“I’m not trying to impress anybody,” he says.

Even some of the people around him, people who insist they like or at least respect him, have trouble getting a fix on the man.

Talented, difficult, frustrating, they say. Hard to figure.

*

His players have a saying: “It’s just your day.”

When it’s your day, Bibby transforms his owlish looks, that shaved head and roundish face. His jaw clamps tight, tugging his eyebrows into a strict angle, etching lines across his forehead. He picks a player and rides him.

“He has mastered that,” guard Brandon Granville says. “If you’re not tough-skinned, you’re not going to last. That’s why we’ve had some guys transfer.”

This season, Bibby angrily chased off three nonscholarship players, or walk-ons, when they complained about having to sit behind the bench. Another player, the once-heralded Nate Hair, says he will consider leaving in the summer.

Teams from Fresno State to Nebraska feature USC players who bailed out. The most common complaints?

Coach is too strict, too caustic, too impatient, yanking players from the game for the slightest lapse. “There is no way you can get comfortable or play all out if you are afraid to make a mistake,” guard Ken Sims said three years ago, after Bibby had kicked him off the team for complaining.

Bibby’s response? “This is big-time basketball.”

Those who have stuck it out, such as Granville and center Brian Scalabrine and forward Jarvis Turner, see a payoff to the tough-guy approach. Scalabrine says: “I want a coach who pushes me.”

From Bibby’s standpoint, it’s that simple. He asks only that his players love the game as fiercely as he does.

Basketball was all he cared about growing up in Franklinton, N.C., a town east of Durham. That meant sitting on his bed, crumpling pieces of paper and tossing them into a hat, imagining he was in the Boston Garden. That meant playing in the yard, taking his lumps from two older brothers.

“We had some brawls,” says Jim Bibby, who became a major league pitcher. “That’s why Henry learned to shoot from outside . . . he had to shoot before we got to him and knocked him down.”

Not naturally gifted, Bibby prevailed with desire, earning a scholarship to UCLA, where he played for Wooden, whom he describes as “like God.” He embraced Wooden’s gospel of discipline and selflessness, turning himself into a passer and defender, becoming a coach on the floor as the Bruins won three national championships.

It was a different era. Former UCLA players say they never expected the coach to be their buddy. With the exception of Walton, they never questioned him.

So when Bibby joined the New York Knicks in 1973, when the team issued him a torn jersey, he mended it himself. When Coach Red Holzman asked him to be a substitute, playing briefly each night, he did not complain. Later, traded to the Philadelphia 76ers, Bibby again accepted the role of passer, distributing the ball to Julius Erving and George McGinnis.

“Henry earned everything he got,” says Walton, whose Portland Trail Blazers defeated the 76ers in the 1977 NBA finals. “Nobody ever gave him anything.”

Discipline made Bibby a success. He believed in it, and when he became a coach, he demanded it. In the minors, he had no qualms about cutting players who shirked. He cannot do the same at USC--which frustrates him--but he still wields the power.

Consider the clash with the walk-ons. At USC, they practice daily but receive fewer perks, such as shoes, than other players. Their names are not even listed in the media guide roster.

Still, when they complained at midseason, after they were asked before a game to sit behind the bench to make room for medical personnel, Bibby reacted angrily, cursing. The players quit.

There was public criticism but this man--who never dreamed of questioning Wooden or Holzman--makes no apologies for how he runs his team. Even his star players are strictly graded in practice each day, not on points or rebounds, but for attitude and hard work.

It is no secret what the coach expects.

“An extension of me,” he says. “I like kids who compete, hard-nosed kids that are like Henry Bibby.”

*

Some days back in Franklinton, Bibby missed school to work in the fields where his father grew tobacco, corn, soybeans and whatever else might turn a profit from the land. Farming under a hot sun made him yearn for something different.

Nothing could have been more different than UCLA. When young Bibby went to dinner with a coach, he did not know what to order, having never been in a proper restaurant. Westwood in 1968 was the first place he saw black and white people together.

“All of a sudden, he is thrown into the big world, and has never left Mom and Daddy’s side,” brother Jim says. “I guess a lot of times, kids like that have a tendency not to mingle with a whole lot of people. It put him in a state of being by himself.”

There were afternoon practices and nights spent playing one on one with Laker guard Pat Riley, who later became one of Los Angeles’ showman-coaches. On weekends, Bibby roamed the city, looking for pickup games.

“There were parties and stuff,” he says. “But I wanted to be a basketball player. That’s all I wanted.”

A friend and teammate, Bob Webb, recalls visiting Bibby’s apartment: “I could tell he didn’t have much company. You always saw him around campus, but I bet you couldn’t find 10 people who could say they had been to Henry’s place.”

That protective shell became part of his image, the notion that he is aloof. Bibby shrugs: “I’m very protective of my territory.”

No outsiders are allowed at his practices and he has a history of skipping public functions. This was certainly not a person apt to bare his soul when his private life began making headlines.

It was the winter of 1997 and Bibby was going through a divorce. His wife, Virginia, portrayed him as an absentee husband and father to their three children during his years in the minors. Even worse, Mike Bibby was a high school All-American who chose to enroll at Arizona, saying, “My father is not part of my life.”

Bibby said little, even though friends urged him to tell his side of the story.

“We all talked to him about it,” assistant coach Silvey Dominguez says. “People didn’t know the real Henry Bibby.”

There was also a skeleton in the closet. In one of his first coaching jobs, in the mid-1980s, Bibby worked on an Arizona State staff that was caught violating NCAA rules. He was accused of improperly contacting a recruit and urging players not to cooperate with the investigation.

The incident not only cost him his job, it made him untouchable. Each time a spot opened in college, each time former teammates such as Erving or Bill Bradley put in a good word, Bibby got passed over.

For 10 years he persevered, taking jobs in the Continental Basketball Assn., the summer leagues in Puerto Rico and Venezuela, working year-round in the quest for a second chance.

Now, he dismisses all inquiries about the Arizona State incident with a standard: “I was the scapegoat.”

There have been allegations of improprieties at USC, accusations that have been investigated and discounted. It irks Bibby no end.

“Don’t guess, don’t speculate,” he says. “My staff and I work honest and that is how I want to be known.”

Friends worry that negative publicity might drive him further into a shell.

“It doesn’t help,” Webb says. “He’s a guy who is thin-skinned right now.”

*

So here’s the twist: Friends insist Bibby can be warm, engaging, caring.

Walton recalls an incident from his sophomore year when he was bedridden with flu: “Henry came over, knocked on my door and said, ‘You’re coming with me.’ He took me over to his apartment, fed me, took care of me all week and got me better.”

It takes some digging, but there are other stories that cast the man in a softer light.

Such as the time USC invited high school recruits to visit campus. Hours before the event began, Bibby was spotted in the team offices, vacuuming the carpets. Another time, he helped one of his freshman players move into a dorm, lugging boxes late into the night.

Assistant coach Dave Miller knows his boss keeps a poker face most of the time, walking through airports with eyes straight ahead, not so much as a smile. But when Miller leaves town, recruiting from city to city, Bibby makes a point of calling his house.

“To make sure my wife and kids are OK,” says Miller, who has worked at half a dozen schools. “I’ve never had a coach do that before.”

Even the players see glimmers, instances when their coach lets his guard down.

“Just those little times when he talks to you one on one,” Granville says. “You can tell he cares.”

Walton scoffs, “We never got that from Coach Wooden. If Henry’s doing that, he’s getting soft.”

Despite the walk-on incident and his feud with Pac-10 officials this season, Bibby says he is trying to lighten up.

On a weekend morning he sits in his office, casual in a black sweatsuit and running shoes, a gold bracelet on his wrist. Mementos of a basketball life clutter the walls: a black-and-white photo of Wooden, that stitched Knick jersey pressed behind glass. There are snapshots of his children by the door. Bibby looks almost content.

And why not? His team is winning and the university has extended his contract through 2005. His reputation is such that he gets mentioned when other teams, such as Nevada Las Vegas, need a coach.

“It means I’m wanted,” he says. “I’ve always wanted to be wanted.”

Not the kind of talk you might expect from this man. He speaks of becoming more flexible as a coach, listening to his players. He muses about his son, Mike, and the problems they have had.

It all dates back, he says, to the relationship he had with his father.

“My father saw me play one basketball game my whole life,” he says. “He couldn’t leave the field and the crops. I never had a problem with it because my father was making a living for me.”

Years later, as Bibby coached his way out of exile, he always sent money home. He says he paid the bills. Virginia has argued it was only the mortgage. Bibby insists he was doing as his father had done.

“I had to be the breadwinner of the family,” he says. “I guess that’s why sometimes I can justify in my mind why things happened with me and my kid.”

He chose not to press this point during his divorce, and rarely mentioned that his eldest son, Hank, was attending USC. Asked why he kept quiet, Bibby stiffens a little. “It wasn’t anybody’s business,” he says.

Nor does he volunteer that he and Mike have rekindled their relationship, talking on the phone, meeting whenever Mike’s team, the Vancouver Grizzlies, comes through town. Not that he isn’t pleased. He is overjoyed. But part of him cannot fathom why people must know about his life away from the game. He sees little use in reporters asking personal questions.

“You don’t need to know who I am,” he says, his guard inching back up. “You only need to know what I do. How I operate and what I do.”

*

On game day, Bibby dresses in Italian wool and gabardine, shimmering ties, expensive shoes. His taste for clothes is such that he uses a bedroom as a walk-in closet in his house near the beach. He says he hasn’t gone Hollywood--his suits come from a Culver City shop known for its discount prices--it’s just that, “I try to look like I’m there.”

The arena. That’s his home. The stretch of wood floor along the sideline.

“When the ball is tipped, that’s when Henry Bibby is most comfortable,” Miller says. “That’s his life.”

Bibby starts each game seated between his assistants, his face nearly expressionless. The calm lasts a minute, maybe two. Then he springs up, drawn to the action, inching those expensive shoes onto the court where the coach is not supposed to go.

Officials must sometimes nudge him out of the way as they try to follow the action. He pays no attention, continuing to wave hand signals and bark commands at his players.

“The team concept is very prominent in his coaching philosophy,” says Gary Cunningham, a former UCLA coach and current athletic director at UC Santa Barbara. “Playing hard, playing good defense . . . those are things he learned at UCLA.”

From the pros, he learned to recognize individual tendencies. He can spot if an opposing player usually shoots after dribbling right. He can quickly call a play to get center Scalabrine open for a jump shot or isolate forward Sam Clancy near the basket.

“Just like the pros,” Washington State Coach Paul Graham says. “He goes with matchups. He does a great job of it.”

But these are intricacies. More blatant is the image of a coach pacing the sideline, his impatience palpable. A guard takes an ill-advised jump shot and Bibby whirls toward the bench and calls for a substitute. A forward throws an errant pass and he’s waving for another change.

The whistle blows, a call goes against his team and his mouth drops open, his arms held out with palms up. It is the sort of reaction that draws the ire of officials and so many technical fouls.

This is what the world sees.

“I’m not trying to offend anybody,” Bibby says. “I’m just trying to be the best coach I can be.”

No glimmers of kindness. Just the gruff exterior, the stereotypical tough guy. Hard to figure.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Five-Year Plan

How the record of USC’s Henry Bibby compares with those of the other 28 Division I coaches who are in their fifth season at their schools. (Coaches are listed in order of victories for first four seasons):

First Four Seasons/2000-01

Coach: Steve Lavin

School: UCLA

W-L: 91-38

Pct.: .705

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): Four, 1997-2000 (7-4)

W-L: 16-6

Pct.: .727

*

Coach: Billy Donovan

School: Florida

W-L: 78-49

Pct.: .614

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): Two, 1999, 2000 (7-2)

W-L: 17-5

Pct.: .773

*

Coach: Charlie Coles

School: Miami of Ohio

W-L: 77-44

Pct.: .636

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): One, 1999 (2-1)

W-L: 12-11

Pct.: .520

*

Coach: Ben Braun

School: California

W-l: 75-50

Pct.: .600

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): One, 1996 (2-1)

W-L: 17-6

Pct.: .739

*

Coach: Murray Bartow

School: Alabama Birmingham

W-L: 73-52

Pct.: .584

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): One, 1999 (0-1)

W-L: 14-10

Pct.: .583

*

Coach: Herb Sendek

School: North Carolina State

W-L: 73-56

Pct.: .570

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): None

W-L: 12-11

Pct.: .522

*

Coach: Bruiser Flint

School: Massachusetts

W-L: 71-57

Pct.: .555

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): Two, 1996, 1997 (0-2)

W-L: 11-11

Pct.: .500

*

Coach: Greg White

School: Marshall

W-L: 68-45

Pct.: .602

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): None

W-L: 14-8

Pct.: .636

*

Coach: Gary Waters

School: Kent

W-L: 68-50

Pct.: .576

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): One, 2000 (0-1)

W-L: 17-7

Pct.: .708

*

Coach: Stan Joplin

School: Toledo

W-L: 65-48

Pct.: .575

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): None

W-L: 15-9

Pct.: .625

*

Coach: Randy Wiel

School: Middle Tenn. State

W-L: 65-53

Pct.: .551

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): None

W-L 5-18

Pct.: .217

*

Coach: James Green

School: Southern Mississippi

W-L: 65-54

Pct.: .546

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): None

W-L: 17-7

Pct.: .708

*

Coach: Bobby Braswell

School: Cal State Northridge

W-L: 63-53

Pct.: .543

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): None

W-L: 15-9

Pct.: .625

*

Coach: Tommy Green

School: Southern

W-L: 62-48

Pct.: .564

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): None

W-L: 8-12

Pct.: .400

*

Coach: John Giannini

School: Maine

W-L: 61-56

Pct.: .521

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): None

W-L: 16-8

Pct.: .667

*

Coach: Wayne Morgan

School: Long Beach State

W-L: 60-54

Pct.: .526

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): None

W-L: 14-11

Pct.: .560

*

Coach: Eddie Biedenbach

School: N.C. Asheville

W-L: 59-56

Pct.: .509

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): None

W-L: 14-10

Pct.: .533

*

Coach: Henry Bibby

School: USC

W-L: 57-57

Pct.: .500

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): One, 1997 (0-1)

W-L: 17-6

Pct.: .739

*

Coach: Jim Platt

School: Charleston Southern

W-L: 56-59

Pct.: .491

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): None

W-L: 8-16

Pct.: .333

*

Coach: Howie Dickenman

School: Central Connecticut

W-L: 56-60

Pct.: .483

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): One, 2000 (0-1)

W-L: 13-10

Pct.: .562

*

Coach: Seth Greenberg

School: South Florida

W-L: 56-60

Pct.: .483

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): None

W-L: 15-9

Pct.: .625

*

Coach: Jimmy Collins

School: Illinois Chicago

W-L: 55-61

Pct.: .474

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): One, 1998 (0-1)

W-L: 9-15

Pct.: .375

*

Coach: Rollie Massimino

School: Cleveland State

W-L: 51-62

Pct.: .451

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): None

W-L: 17-10

Pct.: .630

*

Coach: Ed Dechellis

School: East Tennessee State

W-L: 49-61

Pct.: .445

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): None

W-L: 15-9

Pct.: .625

*

Coach: Rob Spivey

School: Alabama State

W-L: 43-69

Pct.: .384

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): None

W-L: 14-7

Pct.:.667

*

Coach: Mickey Clayton

School: Florida A&M;

W-L: 40-83

Pct.: .325

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): One, 1999 (0-1)

W-L: 6-17

Pct.: .261

*

Coach: Randy Keeling

School: Northeastern

W-L: 38-73

Pct.: .342

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): None

W-L: 6-18

Pct.: .250

*

Coach: Joe DeSantis

School: Quinnipac

W-L: 36-71

Pct.: .336

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): None

W-L: 5-17

Pct. .227

*

Coach: Sal Mentesana

School: Lehigh

W-L: 25-91

Pct.: .216

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): None

W-L: 12-12

Pct. .500

COMPARISON TO THREE FORMER USC COACHES

First Four Seasons/Career

Coach: Bob Boyd

Seasons at USC: 13 (1966-79)

W-L: 64-39

Pct.: .621

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): One, 1979 (1-1)

W-L: 216-131

Pct.: .622

*

Coach: Stan Morrison

Seasons at USC: 7 (1979-86)

W-L: 62-48

Pct.: .564

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): One, 1982 (0-1)*

W-L: 103-95

Pct.: .520

*

Coach: George Raveling

Seasons at USC: 8 1986-94)

W-L: 38-78

Pct.: .326

In NCAA, Yrs (W-L): None**

W-L: 115-118

Pct.: .494

* Morrison had one team make NCAA tournament after fourth season (1985, 0-1 record)

** Raveling had two teams make NCAA tournament after fourth season (1991 and 1992, 1-2 record)

*

THEIR BAD

Officials face disciplinary action after ejecting Bibby from Thursday’s game. D11

TODAY

ARIZONA

at USC

11 a.m., Ch. 2

ALSO

ARIZONA STATE

at UCLA

1 p.m., Ch. 2