Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, February 19, 1991 TAG: 9102190141
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B7 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
That was the route Chuck Daly took, beginning his basketball coaching career in a town best known for its resident groundhog. The trail wound through a couple of college coaching pit stops, four years as an NBA assistant at Philadelphia, a brief less-than-brilliant stop in Cleveland and a longer, much better one at Detroit.
Now Chuck Daly gets the reward for all those practices, all that stomping along sidelines, all that yelling at referees. He will coach the 1992 U.S. Olympic team, a club that could have Magic Johnson and Michael Jordan in the backcourt, Patrick Ewing in the middle, maybe Karl Malone and Charles Barkley on the wings.
"It could be fun," Daly decided.
Fun? It might be coaching nirvana, like landing in the proverbial pot of jam. So, uh, coach, what system do you think you'll use?
"I will adapt to the personnel," Daly said, his eyes twinkling as he thought about the possibilities. "I've coached at every level in every way and that's how I've always done it. You do what the personnel does best. You tailor a system to their skills."
Daly started coaching in Punxsutawney, where he earned $3,600 a year - "$3,000 for teaching, $600 for coaching," he said.
He moved to Boston College and Penn, to the NBA, first as an assistant, then as head man at Cleveland, where he went 9-32 in his first pro head coaching job, and finally to Detroit, where his Pistons are zeroing on winning a third consecutive NBA championship. The Olympic assignment is the last piece of his personal puzzle.
"I think anyone who has an opportunity like this sees that it's a once in a lifetime opportunity," he said. "If you're a [coaching] lifer, it's the ultimate dream. And I am a lifer."
Picking the Olympic team will be the concern of others. Daly functions as an ex-officio member of a committee of 17 charged with selecting his assistants and his players. He'll take his chances with their choices.
The team will be top-heavy with pros - how could it not be? - with three or four college stars along for the ride. How will they get playing time? Who sits? Magic? Michael?
"They'd better be very good to make the club," Daly said. "But they're out there every year. Where do they come from?"
The Olympic situation could be a dilemma for some. If undergrad stars like Kenny Anderson or Shaquille O'Neal turn pro, they would be long shots to go to Barcelona as NBA rookies with Magic, Michael and the others. As collegians, though, they might be picked.
"It will be like coaching an All-Star team," Daly said. "I did that last year and it was the highlight of my career. One day, a half-hour practice and the players adapted."
Still, he knows there are potential problems. "Everybody wants to play 48 minutes and take 48 shots," Daly said. "National pride will enter it. They'll put aside a lot of things to see to it that we'll win."
That is top priority after the bronze medal disappointment of Seoul and Daly knows it.
"The bottom line is we've taught the world to play basketball, and frankly, we've done too good a job," he said.
Even with a team as skilled as the NBA Olympians promise to be, winning is more than a matter of rolling the ball out of the floor. Every locomotive needs an engineer to drive it.
Pressure? Daly laughed.
"In the NBA, you've got 27 guys with CEO jobs averaging $290,000-$300,000 a year," he said. "Every year seven to nine of them are gone. I coached in the finals without a contract for the next year. That's pressure."
Daly knows, however, that with the talent USA Basketball will assemble for him, anything less than a gold medal at Barcelona will be considered a failure.
"Somebody said if we don't win the gold, I ought to stay in Spain," he said.
He thought about that option for a moment and smiled. "You know," he said, "that might not be all bad."
by CNB