Fang’s a Sharp One

Ron Mitchell is men’s basketball coach and athletic director at Coppin State. Please call him Fang.

Mitchell has had a deep voice since he was old enough to talk, drawing comparisons to a character from the 1960s Soupy Sales Show.

The character: White Fang.

“For obvious reasons,” said Mitchell, who is African-American, “we shortened it to Fang.”

Mitchell, 57, has a personal story as deep and layered as that voice.

When Coppin State plays UCLA at Pauley Pavilion today, some fans will recognize the Eagles as an upstart NCAA tournament upset specialist. They shocked South Carolina in 1997, becoming only the third No. 15-seeded team to win a game. A one-point loss to Texas kept the underfunded team from the historically black university in Baltimore from advancing to the Sweet 16.

The joy that came to Mitchell was not from the national publicity, the happy highlights and sound bites.

“It was a wonderful moment,” Mitchell said in a telephone interview this week, “because it proved to a group of hard-working young men that commitment and character pays off.”

Mitchell did not become a coach by any grand plan. He played three sports, including basketball, at Woodrow Wilson High in Camden, N.J., hoping to graduate from high school, get a job and stay out of trouble.

He worked at an aluminum factory. “I got burned,” Mitchell said, “and, man, that hurt. So I tried something else.”

Mitchell washed dishes and waited tables and made enough money to attend Gloucester (N.J.) Community College. He played basketball, and worked the graveyard shift at a bank as a computer operator.

“I still didn’t think about being a coach,” Mitchell said.

When he graduated from community college, Mitchell went to Rutgers-Camden. But, broke after a year, he rejoined the workforce selling shoes and working for a printing company.

Eventually, he met influential businessmen who helped him open his own store, Mr. Fang’s Athletic Attire.

Mitchell, at age 30, was scraping by. He would occasionally lend a hand as a volunteer coach back at Gloucester “for fun,” he said.

And when the head coach became ill, Mitchell offered to take the team for a season. And when the head coach couldn’t return, Mitchell applied for the job on a lark.

“The program had won like 100 games in 11 years,” Mitchell recalled. “I think only three people applied for the job. I got it.”

The next season, the Roadrunners finished 19-11. During the next seven seasons, Mitchell’s teams won at least 26 games. He also went back to night school and earned his college degree.

When Coppin State called in 1985, Mitchell said he figured it would be his one and only NCAA Division I opportunity. His NCAA magic nearly 12 years later was not a surprise to those who had been paying attention.

With Mitchell, the Eagles had upset bigger, better-funded, more prestigious teams -- Maryland, Creighton, Toledo.

Twice in three years Coppin went 16-0 in the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference. He got the Eagles their first postseason win, an upset over St. Joseph’s in the 1996 National Invitation Tournament.

“I have kids who are dying for respect, who give me everything they’ve got,” Mitchell said. “It’s such a pleasure when you see them rewarded, see them in the national limelight, being in front of the national media, handling themselves well. It’s a tremendous feeling.”

Ask Mitchell’s players what they learn from him and they respond quickly.

“Coach uses basketball to teach us about life. He makes us better men,” guard Augustine Woodlin said.

Assistant coach Larry Tucker, who played for Mitchell from 1999 to 2003, said, “What have I learned? Just that you need to be responsible for your actions. Period.”

The Eagles come to Pauley with an 0-5 record. They lost to Charlotte, Lehigh and Alabama State at the Black Coaches Assn. Invitational in Laramie, Wyo., and at Clemson and Xavier.

After UCLA they play at Oklahoma, Illinois, Pittsburgh, Michigan and Michigan State. Then they open conference play with a three-game trip to Delaware State, Bethune-Cookman and Florida A&M.; They don’t play at home until Jan. 14.

“We do it for the guarantee money, some,” Mitchell said. “But I do it for the lesson-teaching too. Let’s face some adversity, let’s learn about ourselves. I don’t care if we go 0-11, 0-12. When we get to the conference these kids will know about themselves.”

Mitchell hasn’t brought a team to Pauley Pavilion before. He has never met legendary UCLA Coach John Wooden, either. “I sure hope I can,” Mitchell said.

Imagine the introduction: “Coach Wooden, Fang ... Fang, Coach Wooden.”