Akron’s Tarver Is Carrying the Load

LeBron James isn’t the only scoring star to play at the University of Akron’s James A. Rhodes Arena.

He lets the University of Akron play there too.

Saturday night, Akron junior Derrick Tarver -- a former player at James’ high school, St. Vincent-St. Mary -- scored 43 points against Central Michigan. It was a performance all the more remarkable because Tarver had a defibrillator implanted in his chest in October after his twin brother survived a heart attack during a pickup game last spring.

The career of Derrick’s twin, Darren, appears to be over at George Mason, where he is still attending classes.

Derrick plays on, with the device in his chest designed to send an electric impulse to his heart to shock it back into rhythm should the rhythm go awry.

“I’m playing this year for him. He’s my inspiration,” said Derrick, whose 22.9-point average ranks 12th in the nation.

“When it happened, I didn’t know what to think at first. I thought Darren just passed out. I couldn’t understand because my parents were crying so much when I talked to them, and I didn’t know how bad it was until I got there. You just couldn’t understand it. You play basketball your whole life and nothing goes wrong, and then something like this.”

Concern quickly turned to Derrick, much as it did for football player Devard Darling after his twin Devaughn’s sudden cardiac death at Florida State two years ago.

“Right when it happened, because we’re twins, it was, ‘Well, maybe you should get tested,’ ” Derrick said. “I didn’t really want to do it at first. I didn’t feel anything was wrong with me. But neither did my brother.”

Medical tests revealed the Tarver twins suffer from a condition called hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, but that Derrick’s is less severe. After exhaustive exams at the National Institutes of Health and the Cleveland Clinic, it was determined that after the implantation of a defibrillator he could continue his career.

“I felt, for Derrick’s future, either way we had to go the nth degree,” Akron Coach Dan Hipsher said. “If they said no.... Basketball means so much to him. We tried to have every opinion available to make sure either way, he knew we’d done everything.”

Even after the implantation, Derrick, a 6-foot-4 guard, couldn’t lift his left arm for two weeks and wasn’t cleared to play for almost two months, getting the OK in time for one practice before Akron’s season began.

“Believe me, those first few days were scary to watch,” Hipsher said. “The doctors assured us it was OK, but it still made me nervous. Now there are no signs or symptoms, so you don’t think about it every day.”

It has been a circuitous route to this point for Tarver, a hometown player who has played at five schools in six years.

He played three seasons at St. Vincent-St. Mary before the arrival of James, the prep phenom, and finished at Akron’s Buchtel High. His high school career was marred by a misdemeanor drug conviction that left him on probation. He later played two junior college seasons at Howard (Texas) College and City College of San Francisco, where he shared California state player-of-the-year honors last season before returning to Akron.

Hipsher, whose two sons play for Akron and grew up playing against Tarver, had no qualms about him, and Tarver -- despite being recruited by Texas Tech Coach Bob Knight -- came home to play for the Zips.

“I had known Derrick since he was in eighth or ninth grade,” Hipsher said. “He put himself in a situation where he was with people he shouldn’t have been with. The feeling was, he didn’t have a personal problem, he was just in a bad situation.”

They’re all in the same situation now, as the 10-11 Zips try to make headway in the Mid-American Conference.

Next season, they’ll add two more players -- Romeo Travis and Dru Joyce III -- from the St. Vincent-St. Mary team that has made Akron a sideshow to the high school headliner that plays a number of games on the Zips’ home court.

“It’s been a great benefit for us,” Hipsher said. “A lot of good teams have come into our arena and played, which is a very private recruiting experience for us. We’ve gotten to see a lot of good teams, and [under NCAA rules] you don’t have to count the days when people come into your building to play.”

Of course, like every other college coach in America, Hipsher has zero chance of recruiting James, projected to be the No. 1 pick in the NBA draft.

“When he was in the seventh or eighth grade, I heard about a really good young player, and when he was a freshman, I went out and saw him, and said, ‘Oh man, is he good,’ ” Hipsher said. “He was the best freshman I’d ever seen. By his sophomore year, he was probably the best player I’d ever seen. I remember I was sitting next to Jim O’Brien, the Ohio State coach, and he said, ‘We’re not even going to try to recruit him.’ We all knew where he was going.”

In a fantasy world, high school players don’t turn pro, and some even stay to play for their hometown teams.

“Oh yeah, that was a great fantasy,” Hipsher said. “You know, LeBron has a little of that in him. He’s a great Akron loyalist. But by the time he was going into his junior year, that fantasy had ended.”

Kentucky’s Bluebloods

Precisely as Louisville returned to the national consciousness -- and about a month-and-a-half after Louisville handed rival Kentucky an 18-point loss -- Kentucky is playing like the best team in the country.

By a long shot.

The Wildcats’ 20-point romp over a talented Georgia team is only the latest victory on a 9-0 tear through the Southeastern Conference in which Kentucky defeated then-No. 1 Florida by 15 and former No. 1 Alabama by 17.

Georgia Coach Jim Harrick, who earlier said it was appropriate No. 2 Louisville (18-2) was ranked ahead of No. 3 Kentucky (19-3) because of Louisville’s December victory, took it back even before Louisville’s loss to St. Louis.

“They’re the best team I’ve seen this year,” he said.

Said Georgia swingman Jarvis Hayes: “If I was in the writers’ poll or the coaches’ poll, they’d be No. 1.”

Perhaps most impressive is Kentucky’s defense.

Five of Kentucky’s last seven opponents have failed to score at least 10 baskets in both halves, the Lexington Herald-Leader noted.

Seven of the last 13 have failed to shoot 40%.

The lineup of Keith Bogans, Gerald Fitch, Marquis Estill, Erik Daniels and Chuck Hayes is playing so well an undefeated run through the SEC seems conceivable, and basketball fans in the state of Kentucky had started to fantasize about a Kentucky-Louisville national championship game.

Considering that even the Kentucky-Louisville regular-season game that marked Louisville Coach Rick Pitino’s return to Rupp Arena last season felt like the Final Four, it’s staggering to imagine a Bluegrass State matchup in New Orleans.

Dean Smith’s Stance

With the death penalty issue in the news since Illinois Gov. George Ryan commuted the sentences of 167 condemned inmates before leaving office in January, Dean Smith, who won an NCAA-record 879 games as North Carolina’s coach, is being noted for his opposition to capital punishment.

In separate stories on the issue this week, the Chicago Tribune and New York Times cited a 1998 meeting with then-North Carolina Gov. Jim Hunt and others at which Smith pointed his finger at the governor and others, saying, “You’re a murderer. And you’re a murderer, and you’re a murderer, and I’m a murderer.”

Smith, who retired in 1997, was part of a delegation called People of Faith Against the Death Penalty.

“I do not condone violence against any of God’s children, and that is why I am opposed to the death penalty,” Smith wrote in “A Coach’s Life,” his 1999 autobiography.

He also has signed a petition calling for a moratorium on capital punishment in North Carolina that will be presented at a conference in March, though he is not scheduled to attend.

Making a Name for Himself

By now, you know Dwyane Wade is no typographical error.

It’s genetic.

“My father’s name is Dwyane. That’s the way his mother wanted to spell it,” said Wade, Marquette’s superb guard.

“I blame my father for it. He could have given me another name.”

Wade and his wife, Siovaughn, have a 1-year-old son.

His name? Zaire.

“I had to break the chain,” Wade said. “I didn’t want Zaire to go through what I went through.”

For example: Teachers wouldn’t believe Wade when he spelled his name.

“Even when I’d tell them, D-w-y, they look at me like, ‘Let me look at this birth certificate.’ ”

His name makes him stand out, but so does his game, and Wade is one of the legion of players in the running for the Wooden Award as the nation’s best player.

The 6-4 guard averages 20.5 points a game and plays a smoothly efficient game that should make him a lottery pick if he comes out after his junior season.

He has three 30-point games this season and only two in single digits.

Wade’s game will be on display Saturday against Louisville in a key game for both teams -- and one that will go a long way toward deciding whether Wade or Reece Gaines, Louisville’s 6-6 point guard, becomes the Conference USA player of the year.