Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, June 28, 1995 TAG: 9506280049
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JACK BOGACZYK
DATELINE: LEXINGTON LENGTH: Medium
On that night at Cameron Hall, Washington and Lee will visit VMI for the first regularly scheduled basketball game between the neighbors whose basketball arenas are all of six-tenths of a mile apart.
It's about time.
It's also for a good cause. The Rockbridge Area Recreation Organization (RARO) will be the primary financial recipient of profits from this Letcher Street border battle that could fill the arena's 5,000 seats. It's a game that's been discussed for years, but one that didn't happen.
Former W&L coach Verne Canfield wanted to play VMI, but only if the Keydets returned the date to the 2,500-seat Warner Center. Canfield, forced to resign after last season, did say he would play the Keydets on the road if W&L athletic director Mike Walsh wanted that. Then former VMI coach Joe Cantafio - now at Furman - said he didn't want to play if Canfield was uncomfortable with the arrangement.
It was no problem with Cantafio's successor, Bart Bellairs, or new W&L coach Kevin Moore, who annually played Division I St. Bonaventure when he was head coach at Elmira. The Lexington schools have been meeting regularly in recent years in sports except football and basketball.
The schools' only previous hoops date was Feb. 27, 1941, a 39-32 VMI triumph in the first round of the Southern Conference tournament in Raleigh, N.C. It seems incredible the two were in the same league for 32 years and never played before or after that one date. However, that tradition, or lack of it, dates from a 1904 VMI-W&L baseball game that ended in a riot.
At that game, ``stones, bayonets, brass guns and blasting powder was brought into play,'' explained one account of the afternoon.
There's no word whether the Cameron entrances will have metal detectors, but perhaps the largest crowd in VMI hoops history is expected. The record for the 15-year-old facility is 4,460 for the December 1981 opener and Virginia's Ralph Sampson-led victory. VMI has never drawn as many as 3,600 for any other home game, although a visit by North Carolina in the 1996-97 season is sure to eclipse that.
W&L didn't begin playing basketball until 1906-07, three years after the baseball incident. The Division III Generals haven't played a Division I opponent since James Madison in 1976-77, the Dukes' first year at the NCAA's top level. W&L and Virginia still traded home dates as late as the previous season. Terry Holland's first game as UVa's coach was a victory over W&L.
The W&L-VMI meeting is only a one-game handshake for now, although both sides say that if more games are scheduled they will be at the same site. W&L hardly is the first Old Dominion Athletic Conference opponent for the Keydets. From 1912 through last season, VMI played 133 games against the other current eight Virginia schools in the ODAC. The Keydets also will play Lynchburg and Eastern Mennonite from the ODAC in 1995-96.
``I'm sure this game will be a great deal of fun,'' Walsh said.
``It will be a great measuring stick for our program,'' Moore said.
``It shows how connected we all are,'' said VMI athletic director Davis Babb.
``It's a no-lose situation,'' said Bellairs, whose team appears to have enough of the other this season with dates at North Carolina, N.C. State, Virginia Tech and Penn State.
And when the latest Battle of Lexington was announced Tuesday, no bricks crumbled up on Main Street. The recumbent memorial of Robert E. Lee in the W&L chapel didn't start spinning. The statue of Stonewall Jackson on the VMI Parade Ground didn't raise a sword. The big news did echo off the walls at Cameron, however.
The schools share a parking lot, a border and connecting piece of street some call ``The Hyphen.'' Some buildings that once belonged to W&L now are VMI's property. Their nicknames share in the name of a motel. Their basketball staffs once even shared an assistant coach at the same time, but never the same floor in a scheduled game.
It's doubtful many, if any, dribble dates matching Division I and III teams will be played with the emotion of this one.
Let's just hope it's a civil war.
by CNB