Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, April 2, 1994 TAG: 9404020092
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By JACK BOGACZYK STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CHARLOTTE, N.C. LENGTH: Long
The Razorbacks' sophomore forward has been compared to Charles Barkley, but Hogs coach Nolan Richardson doesn't agree.
"Williamson is bigger and stronger than Barkley," Richardson said of the 6-foot-7, 250-pound sophomore. "If I had to compare him to someone, he's more like [Charlotte Hornets star] Larry Johnson. Pound for pound, Corliss is the strongest kid in the universe.
"His legs, we don't have any kids on our football team who can lift what this kid can lift. And for as big as he is, he's very agile.
"When you're playing a guy like him, he's so powerful, you have to give him something. He's going to be fouled a lot. It's just been a pleasure watching `Big Nasty' operate. He's had a phenomenal year.
"We really feel he will be one of the best players in the country next season. There aren't many guys who can go one-on-one with him."
Williamson, the Southeastern Conference player of the year, also appears headed for an NCAA Tournament record for career field-goal percentage. He's bulled his way to 53-for-72 shooting in seven games in the 1993 and '94 tournaments.
Williamson needs 70 hoops to qualify for former UCLA great Bill Walton's record of .686 (109-for-159). Williamson's percentage is .736 entering today's Final Four opener with Arizona.
\ BIG DEAL: This is Arizona coach Lute Olson's third Final Four, and he marvels at what the event has become since his first trip, with Iowa in 1980 at Indianapolis.
"You sit here and say it's so big, you don't know how much bigger it can get, but I'm sure in five years it will be bigger than this," said Olson, who took Arizona to its first Final Four in '88.
"The NCAA Tournament is so big that it's almost like the rest of the season means nothing anymore. It's what happens in one game, then the next game, then the next.
"You almost wish it was like the NBA, with best of three or five or seven to determine the champ. You say that, then the problem with that is also why the tournament is so special. It's a one-game shot, and every dog can have his day.
"You look at some of the tremendous upsets [including two suffered to East Tennessee State and Santa Clara in the 1992 and '93 first rounds], and there seem to be more every year. What this is is a great, great sporting event."
\ DEVILISH GATORS: There are some attachments to tonight's Duke-Florida semifinal game that won't be evident on the Charlotte Coliseum floor.
One of the more obscure involves Florida football coach Steve Spurrier and Duke's new coach, Fred Goldsmith, hired this winter from Rice. Spurrier, of course, used to coach at Duke. Goldsmith, like Spurrier, is a Florida alumnus.
Not only are they good friends, but they eloped at the same time - and each was the other's best man at the weddings.
\ BIG HEELS: Even without North Carolina in the Final Four as expected, the Tar Heels still cast a large shadow in their state's largest city.
On Thursday, one Final Four observer said that coach Dean Smith is likely to surpass Adolph Rupp's record 876 college basketball coaching victories in the 1996-97 season, when this season's star freshmen are seniors.
Smith may pass Rupp, but Rasheed Wallace and Jerry Stackhouse are likely to be playing in the NBA by then. Two NBA scouts here to watch the Final Four say Wallace and Stackhouse would be picked in the top seven this June, if they chose to leave UNC.
These are the names mentioned around the NBA as the top 10 lottery picks: Purdue's Glenn Robinson, Cal's Jason Kidd, Duke's Grant Hill, Donyell Marshall of Connecticut, Wallace, Stackhouse, Wisconsin's 6-11 freshman Rashard Griffith, Cal's Lamond Murray, Clemson center Sharrone Wright and UNC pivotman Eric Montross. Michigan center Juwan Howard may have sneaked into that group with his NCAA play, too.
That means the Tar Heels had three lottery picks on this year's team. Next season, Wallace and Stackhouse may give UNC the best two - or at least pro prospects - in college basketball.
\ HISTORICAL: This tournament is the first time since 1963 that either North Carolina, Kentucky or UCLA failed to win at least two games in the NCAA.
\ DOUBLE DATING: Florida and Arkansas give the SEC its first Final Four twins in the league's 61 years, but that situation has become a trend.
Since the field was expanded to 64 teams in 1985, two teams from the same conference have reached the Final Four in eight of 10 tournaments. The exceptions were 1986 and '93.
The ACC and Big Ten have done it twice, and the Big East's multiple trips in 1985 and '87 include its triple of Villanova, Georgetown and St. John's in 1985. The Big Eight had both finalists in 1988.
\ DUKE ALONE: Among these Final Four schools, only Duke has won a semifinal game in the event's history.
Florida is making its first Final four appearance. Arizona is back after its 1988 debut, a semifinal loss to Oklahoma. Arkansas is in its fifth Final Four and is 0-4 in the semifinals, although the '78 team won a third-place game against Notre Dame.
\ ACC SWEEP: Vanderbilt's loss to Villanova in Wednesday night's NIT championship game kept intact one ACC distinction for another year. In Duke and Virginia in 1992, the conference has the only sweep of NCAA and NIT titles by one league in a season since 1979.
\ JUWAN HOME: The best quote not to reach the Final Four came at the Midwest Regional, where Michigan was the runner-up to Arkansas in the Wolverines' bid for a third consecutive national semifinal.
"It will be disappointing if we don't win a national championship for a third time," said Michigan center Juwan Howard, who was stellar in the tournament. "We don't want to be known as the Buffalo Bills of college basketball."
by CNB