THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, August 18, 1994 TAG: 9408180663
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY STEVE CARLSON, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: DIJON, FRANCE LENGTH: Long : 117 lines
He is the guy telling Old Dominion's Monarchs what to eat and what not to eat. He coordinates their sightseeing trips. He assists ODU's coaches in understanding international rules. He tries - usually unsuccessfully - to bridge the language barrier between the Monarchs and their bus driver.
As far as the ODU players know, Bill Wall is nothing more than a tour guide. What they don't know is that he guided amateur basketball in the United States for 18 years as executive director of USA Basketball.
He retired after the 1992 Barcelona Olympics - the Olympics of the Dream Team. Before he retired, the inconspicuous guy wearing the baseball cap on ODU's bus was probably one of the most powerful and prominent people in American amateur and international basketball.
``Man, I did not know this,'' Monarch David Harvey said while reading a short biography of Wall. ``I'm impressed by this. I thought he was just a person who knew the rules.''
Wall knows the rules and then some. As the executive director of USA Basketball, he administered all U.S. international basketball teams from 1974 to 1992, including five Olympic squads. Wall was also the president of the National Association of Basketball Coaches and served on numerous international basketball committees.
He's a storehouse of basketball knowledge. Wall has a vast array of stories, a history of being somewhat controversial and a lifetime of experiences that surpass those of your average tour guide.
Name a prominent figure in world basketball and Wall probably has had some encounter with him, be it a player, coach, the executive director of the NCAA or the NBA commissioner.
He counts among his friends people like Indiana's fiery coach Bob Knight, although they had a brief falling out a few years ago when Knight pulled his team off the floor in an exhibition game against the touring Soviet national team because of an official's call.
``I don't take any (crap) from him,'' Wall said. ``Of course, I don't take any (crap) from anybody.''
Not that he didn't catch some during his career. Remember how the United States was criticized in 1991 for flying its Pan American Games team back and forth from Miami rather than stay in the Havana athletic village? Guess who took the heat. Remember how some people bristled at John Thompson's handling of the 1988 Olympic team? Guess who took the heat.
Wall has felt the fire in many other arenas as well. In 1986, a world championship team featuring David Robinson traveled through Madrid, Spain, with guards armed with submachine guns aboard the bus. It was a time when Libya's Moammar Gadhafi gave Americans overseas pause about the threat of terrorist strikes.
``You're wondering if you're doing the right thing by taking the American kids over there,'' Wall said.
Wall traveled with just about every team that represented the United States in international competition during his tenure. He figures he has been in 50 or 60 countries and has seen every corner of the world except Australia and China. He estimates he flew an average of 150,000 miles a year and spent more than 200 nights a year on the road.
``When you do that for almost 20 years, there comes a time when you say, `Wait a minute, it's time for somebody else to do this,' '' Wall said.
He's got so many stories, he could write a book. So he's going to in 1996, when his retirement buyout agreement with USA Basketball expires. Wall intends to title it ``Off the Wall.''
It will include stories like the time Wall took planes, trains, automobiles, buses and taxis - not to mention hitchhiking across part of the Sahara Desert - to get from Madrid to a meeting in Algeria. An airline strike in Spain had scuttled his original flight.
Or the time he was lying in misery in Manila with food poisoning in a Philippines hotel most people had evacuated because of an approaching typhoon.
Or how difficult it was to stomach the 1980 Olympic boycott ordered by President Jimmy Carter. It was a hurtful decision of which Wall says, ``I will never forget or forgive.''
But many of the stories will center around the 1992 Olympic Dream Team, that unprecedented accumulation of multimillion-dollar basketball bluebloods like Magic Johnson, Michael Jordan and Larry Bird. Although he would prefer to go back to the days when college players composed the U.S. team, Wall said the experience was phenomenal with the level of basketball and worldwide interest the team generated.
Wall chuckles at the memory of a player from Argentina dribbling while motioning at teammates on his bench with his free hand, imploring them to take a picture of him being guarded by Magic during a game.
Most of all, Wall remembers the camaraderie and respect for one another that he said characterized the Dream Team, as well as their gratefulness for the opportunity to play together.
``Michael with his kid, Bird with his little baby - there was a human side to them even though they were making millions and millions of dollars,'' Wall said. ``They just came to play basketball and have fun doing it.''
Wall now is having fun doing what he wants to do.
On this trip, that means traveling and reading anything he can get his hands on that is in English. (Surprisingly, he speaks precious little French.)
When he was with USA Basketball, he subscribed to 25 to 30 daily newspapers, he said. Now that he's retired, he's down to about 10 or 12.
``I don't always agree with sports writers and columnists, but I think it's essential to know what's going on,'' Wall said.
He's also into classical music, jogs, plays racquetball and plays to a 7 handicap in golf. Wall and his wife live in Colorado Springs, Colo., and also have a home in Palm Springs, Calif.
This is the second year Wall has served as a guide for U.S. college teams coming to Europe. He will do some other consulting work as well for foreign teams coming to the United States in November.
``He's obviously well-traveled and has been in Europe for a long time and has a lot of experience with international basketball,'' said ODU coach Jeff Capel, who has known Wall about three years. ``He's not afraid to ruffle the feathers of the foreigners for us when it comes to problems with transportation and meals. It's great to have someone here with that type of experience.
``He's a down-to-earth guy.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo
Bill Wall
by CNB