ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, June 21, 1996 TAG: 9606210022
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-8 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: JACK BOGACZYK
SOURCE: JACK BOGACZYK
There's an axiom in pro sports that Dell Curry is glad team owners insist on following:
You can't fire the team.
That leaves the coach, which explains why Curry, who will begin his 11th NBA season in November, will be playing for the seventh head coach of his pro career. Dave Cowens, a Basketball Hall of Famer, becomes Charlotte's fifth head coach in only the Hornets' ninth year of existence. He's one of an NBA-record nine coaches hired since the start of the just-completed season.
``The owners aren't impatient with coaches, they're impatient with not winning,'' said Curry, who visited coach Page Moir's basketball camp at Roanoke College earlier this week. ``Coaches have less window of opportunity than we do. They know it.''
Curry wasn't surprised fellow Virginia Tech alumnus Allan Bristow was canned by the Hornets with a year left on his contract.
``Allan had been there five years,'' said the Charlotte swingman, who is regarded as one of the league's best off-the-bench players. ``We didn't make the playoffs in three of those. You can't complain he deserved a longer chance than he got. That's how it works.''
Cowens has the same head-coaching experience Bristow did when he moved to Charlotte's sideline from the front office: none.
``I've met [Cowens], but I don't know anything about him other than how I remember him as a player,'' Curry said. ``He's less experienced than Allan.
``You still play the same game. Dave knows what type of player I am, so I don't see any reason to worry.''
Curry, who will turn 32 next week, now is much more comfortable with his situation than when Bristow took over, and for good reason. Curry, with two years left on a contract that will pay him close to $2 million in 1996-97, is an established NBA player. No longer do trade rumors follow him every off-season.
He will score the 10,000th point of his career next season. A winner of and consistent contender for the NBA Sixth Man Award, he has a niche that's provided by his right arm.
``Everybody needs a shooter,'' he says.
The Hornets (41-41) missed the playoffs by one game this year, and Curry said the team still felt good about what it accomplished.
``It wasn't a bad year, but it did have a lot of changes,'' he said. ``If anybody had told us we'd finish .500 after we lost our center [Alonzo Mourning, in a trade with Miami], we'd have never believed it.''
Nor would Curry have believed it 10 years ago this week - when he was a first-round draft pick by Utah - if someone had told him he'd be looking forward to his 11th NBA season.
``No way I thought that,'' he said. ``My goal was to try and play eight years, double the average player's time in the NBA. I'd have been happy with that. Now, they're going to have to kick me out. I still love to play. I'm healthy. I'll play the last year of my contract at 33. I can go past that.
``I do think I appreciate the game more, because I know my window is slowly closing. I want to win a championship. That's what you play for.
``How long can I play? Well, `Chief' [teammate Robert Parish] is over 40 [he will turn 43 in August]. That's a long time. I have 10 now, so I see no reason why I can't go at least 14, 15.''
As Curry said that, his oldest son, Stefan, 8, was doing cross-over, between-the-legs dribbling at a basket across the Bast Center floor. Stefan is one of the overnight campers at the session. ``I enjoy watching him play, but it does make me feel older,'' Curry said.
``He already plays better defense than his dad,'' Moir said.
Yeah, but Stefan's dad shoots it better. That's why he's reached double figures in the NBA in seasons as well as in scoring average.
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