March 6–13, 1997

cover story

 

Coach

For Temple's legendary John Chaney, winning is still everything.

By Scott Farmelant

 

John Chaney's phone rings a day shy of his 65th birthday, a cold, clear Martin Luther King Day. It's Bobby Knight. Indiana University's basketball coach, one of the best in the land, is down in the dumps.

"Tell me, John, how do you handle losing?"

Losing? Chaney's Temple Owls lost a game in overtime a day before, blowing three last-minute chances to beat Xavier University. Five days earlier, somebody fired a bullet into the brain of Ennis Cosby, the only son of Chaney's good friend, the "sweetheart kid" who once spent a summer at Chaney's basketball camp. A month before, Vic Harris, a playground pal from way back at the Christian Street Y in '48, passed away.

Tell me John, how do you handle losing?

A silent second passes. On the file cabinet behind Chaney, in a memorabilia-filled, paneled shoebox the coach calls an office, a photo of Jimmy Maloney smiles. Jimmy Maloney, 62 years old. Three decades as Temple's assistant basketball coach. Maloney was Chaney's best friend, his alter ego. Maloney's heart stopped beating on the Ben Franklin Bridge last May 3.

Tell me John, how do you handle losing?

John Chaney opens his mouth. A metaphor pops out — a blind man, the circus, nonsense. Another day, another literary device. Except this one carries no meaning, no secret to life. It's a question Chaney can't answer. So the coach talks hoops.

Playing Michigan at home tomorrow, Bobby?

Good luck.

Click.

—-

Sometimes, it seems John Chaney has paced the sidelines at Temple University's McGonigle Hall forever. But Chaney was hired in 1982 at age 49, following a decade as coach of Cheyney University of Pennsylvania. In those 15 years, players have graduated, friends have died. Now Chaney, an old coach playing the young man's hustle, has hit the age when many retire.

Coaches live by the hustle, by wooing the kid who will make his team win. The pitch to star schoolboys is always the same. Maybe it's cloaked in the guise of a university's fine academic and athletic tradition. Maybe it's delivered with fiery speeches and daily lessons about life's unforgiving ways. Maybe it's gift-wrapped with stacks of hundred-dollar bills and a fancy car. But it never changes.

Kid, there's a multimillion-dollar contract out there.

You can put your name on it.

If you play for me.

The coach has no other choice. Without the hustle, there are no wins. Without wins, there's no six-figure annual salary. No six-figure sneaker contracts. No television shows. Even when coaches win, they need to win more. Coaches don't want to be the next Jim Harrick, the UCLA head man who won the 1995 national title only to be fired in 1996.

"As much as an evil as it is, you've got to do it," Chaney says. "It's the worst part of this business, but what else are you going to do? Have phone sex with a kid? You're always got to try and convince the kid that you love him more than the other guy."

Of course Chaney being Chaney, he's never played the hustle like other coaches. When a kid comes to Chaney's school, the only sale he hears is hard. One shout at a time, Chaney will make his players forget their reverse dunks, their fancy dribbles, all the sweet things other coaches ever told them.

"I don't want that Houdini shit!"

At Temple, players drag their ass out of bed every morning so Chaney can holler at them in the gym, 5:30 a.m. sharp. Temple players don't showboat, not even when they grow up to become an NBA All-Star like Eddie Jones. They don't miss study hall sessions, don't get arrested for committing felonies. Chaney's players do two things: they listen when the coach speaks and they reject losing.

"Winning is an attitude. Stupid is forever."

Just maybe, the Temple player gets his degree, learns how to live life, and becomes a man. But Chaney won't lie to him, not about the 50,000-to-1 odds of landing a job in the NBA, not about the mistakes he makes on the court. After a quarter-century, the pitch remains constant. It's the hard way, the Chaney way.

"Stick with what you know."

Naturally, the best players go elsewhere. They enroll at Duke with its beautiful campus and its "crazies" — fans who wait hours for a ticket. They attend Syracuse and Kentucky where 30,000 people roar in approval night after night. Or Kansas, North Carolina, UCLA. Anywhere but Temple. The Show-Me-The-Money studs don't care that Chaney's better than any coach, owner of the game's eighth-best winning percentage. Not that early in the morning.

So Chaney wins with the poor, the wretched, the leftovers. In 1972 at Cheyney, it was McKinley Walker, blind in one eye with a bullet lodged in his back. In 1997, it's quiet Huey Futch, the Temple senior from Dade County, FL. Orphaned at a young age, Futch was living in a foster home when Hurricane Andrew blew his roof away five years ago. But Futch never missed a day at school, never stopped playing basketball, even took out a $13,000 student loan so he could play for Chaney.

Once Chaney lands his kids, he tests them, tests them and tests them some more. Life's taught Chaney that much. A person is tested when he's born into poverty, abandoned by a father and raised by an aunt called "Mama." A person is tested when he arrives in Philadelphia at age 12 from the Jacksonville, FL, ghetto called Black Bottom only to take up residence in a rat- and roach-infested house at 1707 Ellsworth St. A man is tested when he's Philadelphia's best high school player of 1951 but nobody recruits him because he's black. A man is tested when he goes down to Bethune-Cookman College in Florida believing he has a scholarship, then finds that he must beat out 36 other desperate black kids for that opportunity. A man is tested when he goes on to score 2,000 points at Bethune-Cookman only to discover that pro basketball doesn't want him — except for a bunch of clowns from Harlem. A man is tested by working two jobs to support his wife and kids while playing semi-pro ball in the sticks on weekends earning 60 bucks a game. A man is tested when a car wreck takes him away from the game he's built a life around. A man is tested when he buries his mother, his brother, his sister and his stepfather before his 60th birthday.

And for Chaney, all tests are conquered with the same answer. Never give in. Sixty-five years teaches a man that much.

"I never knew where I was going," Chaney says. "I just knew where I didn't want to go."

It's a lesson Chaney passes on and on. To Walker, who quit Chaney's team in the middle of his senior year so he could complete his degree. To Futch, the player who rarely starts even though he's a team captain and the Owls' lone senior. Futch is on target for a degree in social work. Chaney's players suffer, persevere, and when it's all over, share a good cry with the man who put them through it.

"America's greatest coach," marvels Speedy Morris, the coach at La Salle University who once lauded Chaney for giving his players "a message about life, every day."

"Today's player needs him," says Phil Martelli, the head coach at rival St. Joseph's University. "They may not understand it. Other people may not understand. But today's players need John Chaney. More than ever."

—-

Saturday, Feb. 15, 9:14 a.m.: Keaney Gym, Kingston, RI, 29 hours before tip-off against the University of Rhode Island.

"Tomorrow, I want you to be where you're supposed to be, doing what you know. Do what you must to win. That's what good teams, great teams do. That's what successful people do. I don't give a shit where it is, at home, in business. When you give up on what you know, you're a failure. Or working on being a failure. A car can have four cylinders, six cylinders, eight cylinders, it doesn't matter. Those cars are gonna go, they're gonna get there. The only difference is how. It doesn't matter which one you are. But a four-cylinder car can't be a six-cylinder car. A car's got to do what it knows. A four-cylinder car that tries to be a six-cylinder, that doesn't make sense. And a player who's stupid is one who tries to be an eight-cylinder car when he's a four-cylinder. A player who's stupid is a player who makes the same mistake over and over. With his eyes open. A blind man doesn't do that. A dog doesn't do that. You've got to listen, learn. Listen, learn. Listen, learn."

—-

With time running out on the Temple-Rhode Island game, a train bears down on Keaney Gym. The engineer is Tyson Wheeler, Rhode Island's point guard speedster. The power comes from Ibn-Hashim Bakari, a Rhody senior who previously averaged 1.4 points per game. The locomotive is fueled by 3,885 people who stamp their feet and scream as one.

Pundits said this match-up would come down to will. Both teams stand among the elite of an Atlantic-10 conference that holds 12 teams. Rhode Island owns the potent offense, Temple the unyielding defense. For 37 minutes, Rhode Island holds the upper hand but Temple, led by Juan "Pepe" Sanchez and center Marc Jackson, meets the challenge. Then the train enters the gym with three minutes left and the score knotted at 73.

Wheeler dribbles down the court and hits a three-point shot. On the ensuing possession, Wheeler strips Sanchez and takes the ball in for an easy lay-up. Chaney watches the train's arrival in near silence. Sanchez, who will miss but two shots on the way to 27 points, scores seven points in the game's final 90 seconds. But it's too late. Rhode Island wins 85-82. Those are the most points Temple has scored all year — and the most the Owls have surrendered.

At practice, Chaney stressed two things — derail Wheeler and stop Rhode Island's inside game. Instead, Wheeler shot his way to 25 points and dished out six assists. Rhode Island's front line amassed 46 points and 13 rebounds. Bakari — who? — made five of five three-pointers on his way to 22 points, 14 more than his season high. When the buzzer sounds, Chaney leaves the floor without a word.

A different Chaney is in the locker room. His booming, angry voice escapes into the hallway outside the changing room. Two minutes of yelling turns into five. Fifteen minutes pass. An Owl booster wonders whether the coach will scream for an hour like he did two weeks back after a terrible loss at St. Bonaventure. When Chaney emerges, his face is a mask of weariness and despair. Yet a step later, he's bantering, joking and hugging his daughter Pam, a pleasant-looking woman in her mid-30s.

"I'm blaming this on you," Chaney cackles, then tells everyone he can, "This is my daughter — she brought me bad luck."

Up in the media room, Chaney tells it like it was.

"I have nothing but praise for that team and its coach," Chaney says. "Hopefully, you will impose your will on a team. Usually we do. But they were the better team. They are a great offensive team."

There's not much else Chaney can say, not when his game plan has been steamrolled. For years, the Owls have forced others to play their way with methodical, guarded play. Today, Rhode Island and Temple played a gorgeous game of high-speed basketball, the antithesis of the Chaney way.

Chaney's usual style centers on control. Players must control turnovers, tempo and floor balance. With the right people in the right places doing the right things, Chaney will have his way. Even when the opponent sees it coming. Chaney's troops play with more discipline, more selflessness, than anybody on the block. Watching Temple at its best is like watching somebody suck on an ice cube until it disintegrates.

"They will not give you a window to crack through," says Martelli of Temple.

"Successful people win their way, they don't change with the times," adds Morris. "That's John Chaney's way. John Chaney is about perfection. He gets his players to play as close to perfection as they can."

Given the caliber of this year's Owl squad, perfection's a must. In the talent department, this year's squad came with a bunch of question marks.

There's Sanchez, the wide-eyed 19-year-old from Argentina. He's the team's point guard, a freshman and relative stranger to American basketball. All Chaney asks Sanchez to do is always pass the ball to the right shooter and never throw the ball away. Thing is, Chaney hadn't counted on Sanchez as a starter. Then the NCAA disqualified freshman Quincy Wadley for 1996-97 because of a bureaucratic difference of opinion involving incompletes, even though he passed his scholastic boards and made his grades. Sanchez hasn't left the starting line-up this year, averaging 38 minutes a game out of 40.

Team anchor Marc Jackson is another puzzle. The 6-foot-10-inch 270-pounder is a bruiser of a center. But he's slow, has poor footwork and limited jumping ability. All Jackson does is battle, score, rebound. There's also sophomore Rasheed Brokenborough out of Philly, the nation's 10th best high school player of 1994-95 in the eyes of Blue Chip Illustrated. Brokenborough is a gifted scorer, a swift player and tenacious competitor. But the silky left-hander owns the oddest-looking shot in America — Brokenborough shoots off his right shoulder. "Broken-shot," Owl fans chuckle.

Sometimes its seems like the Owls have more limitations than a President's Day auto sale. Forward Lynard Stewart misses half his free throws. Futch is consistently inconsistent. Two 6-foot-9-inch freshmen, Lamont Barnes and Julian Dunkley, brim with talent. But Barnes is passive for every play he is aggressive. Dunkley has the team's prettiest shot, but plays defense like a drunken sailor.

"This Temple team is not good enough to win the whole thing," sums up Morris.

So they endure practice after repetitious practice, learning Chaney's famed match-up zone until it's mistake-free. They submit to verbal tongue-lashings for each mental error they make. They follow Chaney's edicts without question or sit on the bench. The solace comes on the scoreboard. That's where Chaney has racked up 557 wins at the college level, plus another 131 in high school and junior high.

A quick read of recent headlines shows that it still works. The Owls "jolt" fourth-rated Cincinnati. They "trap" Duquesne. They "still" Virginia Tech. They "squeeze" St. Joe's.

"This is John's kind of team," says Sonny Hill, a voice of Owl basketball on 90.1 WRTI-FM. "They have a thirst for learning. They listen to John."

"Nobody wants to play Temple," adds Speedy Morris.

—-

"There are very few people who know coach Chaney," says Sonny Hill. "There are people who think they know John. But they don't. The John Chaney they see is the exact opposite of what he appears to be."

Hill is talking about the public face of John Chaney, the personification of rage unleashed. This Chaney has slugged opposing coaches and team doctors. This Chaney threatened to "kill" his greatest rival three years back. This man's "One-Eyed Jack" stare, the glower aimed at bad referees, remains the stuff of legend. This is El Tabasco, the nickname hung on Chaney by Marc Jackson, the one that makes him chuckle. This is the guy who lands a $10,000 fine for trashing the refs after the St. Bonaventure loss. This is the man who churns insideyears after every incident, always hating that people saw him act like an ass.

This is also the man who shops at Saks Fifth Avenue in Bala Cynwyd about once a week. There, Chaney never passes up a chance to tease a pair of saleswomen named Bev and Rhoda. Chaney pits one against the other in a battle for black-eyed pea soup(which he cooks up at home), a treat both will no doubt enjoy the next time Chaney drops by. Chaney's the man who walks into Murray's Deli to pick up a quarter-pound of chopped liver and a corned beef/pastrami sandwich and walks out with chopped liver, tongue, salami, knishes, kishke. Chaney's the man who will cackle to the deli man scurrying about, "You're cleaning me out!"

Chaney's a man who tells everyone he meets about Sam Browne, "my white Jewish father," his coach at Ben Franklin High who clothed him, fed him, sent him to summer camp in the Poconos, and most important, pleaded with Chaney until he got on the train to Bethune-Cookman — the hardest thing Chaney had ever done. Chaney's the guy buying pig's feet at Cannuli's on Ninth Street so he can cook 'em up with garlic, salt, pepper, hot sauce, then give it all to a friend. This summer, Chaney will again fill his cooler with fancy German and Belgian beers — lagers and pilsners only — then toss it in the truck along with pounds of peanuts "cooked the black man's way." Maybe he'll buy ribs. He'll bring it all by a buddy's house after playing tennis. The gang will "sit around and lie."

Chaney reads poems. He basks in his players, and not just the 10 who made the NBA. Derek Brandley, he's an actuarial. Granger Hall is an executive. Howie Evans teaches and Ernest Pollard is a Philadelphia police detective. Chaney beams when he mentions Mik Kilgore and Jason Ivey. The pair are students again, trying to complete their degrees.

Chaney loves the Big Brother/Big Sister program. He chipped in $15,000 of his own money to build the Apollo, to "bring a bigger dimension to this university." Chaney admits to missing John Calipari, the ex-UMass coach now with the New Jersey Nets, the foe he threatened with death.

"Sure I miss him," Chaney laughs. "He made things exciting. He always put up a great fight."

And Chaney is the man who had a sandwich.

It was 1988 atthe Meadowlands in East Rutherford, NJ, the site of the NCAA Tournament's "Elite Eight," the last step before the Final Four. Temple had fielded its greatest team ever — 32 wins against two defeats.

During an off-day, Chaney snuck away from the team hotel with Tony Pinnie. The pair had been friends since high school — Chaney and his Italian pal. Both grew up "poor as we could be." Chaney always carried a lunch to school — lettuce, tomato and mayo sandwiches. Pinnie did too, broccoli rabe on bread. But not on this day. The two headed to the Lower East Side and Carnies' Deli.

Chaney ordered "specials" with a combination of corned beef and pastrami. The bill came to $28. Chaney brought two skyscraper-sized sandwiches to the car. The men unwrapped the food and took a bite. The friends looked each other in the eye. They began to laugh.

"It was something," Chaney says, eyes twinkling at the memory. "How far we had come. To buy a sandwich and not worry about how much we paid. We had a sandwich, man. We had a sandwich."

—-

In the basketball season, the old-timers ride the elevator a dozen floors to Williamson's Restaurant atop the GSB Building. There they gather, the William H. Markward Memorial Basketball Club — coaches, players and refs of a schoolboy era long since passed. They drink Buds and Michelobs, then enjoy a hot meal over memories and yesterday's ballgames. After lunch, Andy Dougherty grabs the microphone and introduces — and ribs — every last person in the room. High school stars of today shuffle to the roster, offering thank yous for the recognition they've come to receive.

On this Wednesday, Dougherty introduces Chaney as guest speaker, "the coach whose middle initials are NCAA." Dougherty says Chaney must quit his job and save the 76ers.

"That's a terrible fate you have planned for me," Chaney replies, to the delight of the 150-person gathering. The room then quiets as Chaney's long, worn fingers begin to rub the watch on his wrist.

"I'm a very old man," Chaney says, looking at the five teens to his right. "When I was your age, I got this very same award."

Chaney removes the watch and reverses the band. He reads the back of his gleaming, 21-jewel Hamilton.

"'John Chaney. 1951 Public School MVP.' Here, take a look."

The watch, the "most precious" item Chaney owns, passes from player to player. And a story begins.

In 1951, a referee named Abie Abrams whistled "Cherokee" Chaney for a foul. It was a big game early in the year. Abrams' call set the city's best player off and Chaney hurled a stream of curses at Abrams. Chaney's temperature grew hotter still when Abrams called a technical foul. Chaney responded by raving some more. Abrams replied by tossing Chaney out of the gym. After the game, Abrams sought Chaney out.

"If you're a bad person when you're young," Abrams told Chaney, "sometimes you grow up to be a bad person."

The words jolted Chaney, a teen who'd already flirted with the bad person inside him. When Chaney was 13, a kid named Dante beat and mugged him nearly every day. Chaney ended that with the wooden mallet he swung at Dante's skull. Only a teacher's quick reaction spared Chaney from juvenile lock-up. On the court, Chaney tackled any opponent who dribbled by him, even after he broke a kid's ankle. One time, Chaney spit in a ref's face.

But as Chaney tells this story, all of that was nothing compared to what nearly happened when he was 14.

Chaney had disobeyed his mother by hanging with his friends after curfew, then suffered a bad-ass whipping in return. A few days later, the same crew came around looking for Chaney.

"John's grounded," said his mother Earley.

The young Chaney threw a tantrum. He destroyed his bedsheets, overturned his possessions. He thought about sneaking out the window. But something, perhaps fear of another whipping, or a voice inside him — Chaney can't say — kept the teen inside that house. Two hours later a police car siren screamed by Chaney's window.

"Those other boys broke into a house and raped a girl," Chaney tells the now-silenced room. "I could have been with them if I didn't listen to my mother. I could have gone to prison."

Chaney tells the Markward Club how Abrams' words stayed with him, scared him for three months, made him work hard every day to control his emotions. At the end of the '51 season, Chaney got his watch from the Markward Club the same token Chaney now held for all to see.

"So you see, it's never too late to change and move in the right direction. It's never too late."

—-

Wednesday, Feb. 26, 6:22 a.m., McGonigle Hall, 78 hours before Temple's final regular-season game at Massachusetts.

"I really don't know what you're made of when you shoot bad shots. I don't really know what you're made of when you give up baseline shots. It's the end of the year and I have to look for signs of weakness in you guys. It's a damn shame. You guys aren't ready to play. It's a goddamned shame!! We're not conducting a fuckin' experiment here!!! Listen, goddamnit! Use what you know, use what you know! I'm not here to make somebody famous, I'm here to win. And the only way to win is to use what's in the toolbox! How many errors of mindless bullshit do you want to go through? How many errors do you want to make before you lose a fuckin' ballgame? You're not that good, you're not fuckin' pros. There are too many guys on this team with excuses, too many babies. I want players who are mean and fuckin' tough!!! This is the end of the season now, fellas. But all you guys have are excuses. When do you plan to become a man and take responsibility? When you lose at life, you have excuses. People who lose at life, all they have are excuses."

"Remember what I told you on Oct. 15. Remember the first day — how you finish is how you start."

—-

Julian Dunkley, all legs and arms, slaps the ball out of bounds, keeping his man from scoring the easy dunk. And coach stops practice and yells. The tormenting voice, Chaney's look. Dunkley's eyes pop.

"I tried, coach," Dunkley says.

"Trying ain't good enough!!!" Chaney screeches. "You can't say 'I'm trying, I'm trying.' I've been trying all my goddamned life. Trying don't mean shit!!!"

Out near the foul line, a voice mumbles something. Chaney barks at the offender.

"Shut the fuck up! You cannot listen with your fuckin' mouth!!"

Chaney turns to Sanchez.

"Pepe, what did Julian do wrong?"

Sanchez looks at his feet, then delivers a quiet answer. Julian let me pass it inside, Sanchez says. Julian left an opening. Julian did not stand where he should have.

Chaney takes Dunkley's arm and positions him across the hip of fellow 6-foot-9-inch freshman Lamont Barnes, directly between Sanchez and the basket. Chaney throws the ball to Sanchez.

"Pass it."

The ball bounces. Right into Dunkley's hands. Chaney tosses the ball back to Sanchez, then pushes Dunkley to the right of Barnes.

"Pass it again."

The ball skips by Dunkley into Barnes who scores an easy lay-up. Dunkley's eyes widen.

Practice ends.

"Go to classes," Chaney shouts at his departing players. "Learn something."

In three days,another test looms for Temple: the UMass game.With 17 wins, the Owls are in position to wrap up an eighth consecutive NCAA berth. Otherwise, Temple must win once — and possibly twice — during the A-10 Tourney at the Spectrum March 5-9 to make the post-season "Big Dance" (UMass will triumph 59-53).

Win or lose, Chaney has enjoyed a successful year. Triumphs over Louisville and Cincinnati again put the spotlight on his considerable coaching ability. Two defeats of a ranked St. Joe's squad insured local bragging rights, even though Chaney detests that (he believes rampant parochialism in Philadelphia retards overall growth of college teams). Already, the Owls resemble a future power with four top players just finishing their first year. Given all Chaney's been through in one year — "times I faltered, times where I looked down at the road instead of looking up at the sky," he says — this hope may prove a powerful tonic.

"Only one thing works — working hard," Chaney says. "Everything else is something you can't control. When I look at these kids, I see the same players I've always had. The faces are different but they're the same. These kids are going to grow, they're going to get better. Maybe not now, but sometime."

Chaney has time to find out. Temple does not have a mandatory retirement age. Observers like Hill and Morris say that as long as Peter Liacouras is Temple's president, Chaney keeps his job. But Chaney promises the day will come when he will go.

"Someday I want to say, 'No, I ain't working no more.' That's why I work so hard. I want to earn the right to say that."

—-

John Chaney celebrates his 65th birthday in front of the television. He's watching the game between Indiana and Michigan. There's Bobby Knight on the sidelines. The Hoosiers' second-best player is next to him on the bench with foul trouble. The team's top player sits a few chairs down, sidelined by injury. Knight scowls when Indiana misses a shot. And another.

Five minutes go by without an Indiana score.

On defense, Indiana plays a zone. Knight has abandoned his trademark man-to-man coverage. Chaney watches a Michigan guard dribble the ball down the floor. Pass, dribble, miss. Indiana gets the rebound. It happens again. And again. Indiana survives, winning 72-70.

Bobby Knight's phone rings the next morning, two days after Martin Luther King's birthday. Chaney's on the line with an answer to Knight's question: How do you handle losing?

"Bobby, losing is a disease," Chaney says. "You don't have it. I don't have it. We don't handle losing. We don't accept it."

"Damn right," Knight says, and hangs up.