Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, March 6, 1991 TAG: 9103060048
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Jack Bogaczyk
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
That wasn't quite what Elvis sang, of course, but then the Metro Conference won't be stopping by Graceland anymore. Memphis State has spent 16 years in the Metro, but now the Tigers and Cincinnati are joining something called the Great Midwest. It's so great, its geography includes Alabama-Birmingham.
Then, again, how did Blacksburg ever get a stop in anything with the name Metropolitan? Maybe when Bill Matthews was Virginia Tech's associate athletic director, he told the Metro men he was going to strip-mall U.S. 460.
Anyway, I digress. The Metro will never be the same. Florida State is giving the ACC another Coach K in Pat Kennedy, and South Carolina is headed for the Southeastern Conference, where the Gamecocks could be blinded by Shaquille O'Neal, Kentucky and Wimp Sanderson's sportcoats.
Teams have left the Metro before - Georgia Tech in 1978 B.C. (Before Cremins) and St. Louis in 1983. Several coaches cried when St. Louis walked after going 0-7 in seven Metro tournaments, but I could never figure out what a Billiken was. St. Louis is in the Great Midwest, too, so how great can it really be?
St. Louis' major contribution to the Metro was the league's first commissioner, Larry Albus. He was a marketing whiz. Albus had so many deals, writers referred to him as "the game show host." When Steve Hatchell replaced Albus, Hatchell opened a closet door in the Metro offices in St. Louis. He found a bunch of catcher's mitts. Albus had gotten them in one of his deals for TV time.
Think back, but let's not talk basketball. There likely are some things about the Metro outposts you didn't know. Don't you think the departing teams will miss bouncing into Roanoke Regional Airport annually? No more ribs at Gridley's or the Rendezvous in Memphis or the Montgomery Inn in Cincinnati for Metro visitors?
Pardon me while I bring up the subject of Checkerdome hot dogs for consumption. I ate dinner one night at a Checkerdome concession stand about an hour before a game. A locker room guard told me to use lots of mustard. "That way," he said, "you can't see the color of the dog." Maybe those dogs were the reason they called the St. Louis NHL team the Blues.
There also was the Metro tournament at Louisville several years ago, when one of the massive Kentucky Fair & Exposition Center wings of Freedom Hall was rented to a livestock show. The media and VIP dining room also was in that wing. It seems like every time I took a bite of roast beef, those cows were heard. A moo-ving experience in Metro history.
I'll never forget an early '80s Piedmont flight to Cincinnati for a game. It was one of those YS-11 models. The plane stopped in Bluefield, Charleston and Huntington. As we were dodging mountains heading for Charleston's plateau airport, a man seated two rows behind me screamed, "I wanted to stop in Beckley, you son of . . . "
Freedom Hall has the best basketball atmosphere in the country, and you can't beat the tasty onion-ring loaf at the Rib Tavern in Louisville. How I miss the black bean soup at the old F&T Restaurant in downtown Tallahassee. We'll miss Mid-South Coliseum just as we did Tully Gym.
And I'm sure the Metro departees will miss the distinctive, dapper and unbiased showman and Freedom Hall public address announcer, John Tong:
"At forward-a, from Loo-a-vul Eastern, Herbert-a Crook . . . And-a from this-a point on, both teams will-a shoot the bonus."
I remember trips into Memphis and watching then-Tigers coach Dana Kirk doing TV ads for home security systems. You read that right.
I remember telling Hatchell at the 1987 Metro tournament: "With one program dead after a point-shaving scandal and three others being investigated by the NCAA, I guess it's appropriate that the Metro player of the year is named Crook."
I remember having my portable computer unplugged by maintenance workers at Riverfront Coliseum - several times.
It was always nice to visit New Orleans - not just for Preservation Hall and Pat O'Brien's and beignets at the Cafe du Monde, but also for the wit and wisdom of Tulane assistant athletic director M.L. LaGarde.
After I met M.L., I realized where Charlie Moir got his material. It was former Virginia Tech coach Moir who once said, "If that's guy's a Parade All-American, I'd like to know which parade it was in."
The Memphis State Pom-Pon Squad might never brighten a Metro floor again. This could be the biggest loss in Metro history. I found it unsurprising that the male fans at Mid-South always made their restroom and concession-stand trips during the game.
I remember my first trip to Hattiesburg, and the pickup truck Southern Miss boosters drove onto the Reed Green Coliseum floor to present to coach M.K. Turk. I remember when Turk's team used to be St. Louis-reincarnate. That's history, too.
I remember a Metro tip-off reception in Louisville, when the centerpiece on the buffet table was an ice sculpture of the "metro" logo. I remember a former Metro athletic director taking more than his share of fresh shrimp from that table. I can still see the ice sculpture. I can still see the face that lunched a thousand shrimps.
So, you can take the Metro's members, but you can't wipe away the memories. You can call it Avron Fogelman Arena. It's still Tulane Gym.
\ AUTHOR NOTE: Jack Bogaczyk has covered the Metro Conference for this newspaper since 1979.
by CNB