THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, November 18, 1994 TAG: 9411180586
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY TOM ROBINSON, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 77 lines
A coach's life at a small, private Division III school is uncertain enough without the bother of trying to return a basketball program to the track largely on the talents of 10 freshmen.
There we have the great, wide unknown staring at Virginia Wesleyan's Terry Butterfield this season.
``There are a million reasons why we have to recruit in numbers,'' said Butterfield, the Marlins' sixth-year coach, noting rates of graduation and of academic and economic attrition. ``This year, we felt we had to really restock our talent. But it wasn't like we went out looking for all those new kids. One year you might get two kids, and one year 10 kids. Because we don't have scholarships, we don't turn anybody away.''
So 10 newcomers turned up on the first day of practice, hailing from New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, Maine, Chesapeake and Portsmouth, home of 27-year old rookie Sean Blackwell.
Butterfield, naturally, is bullish on the collected potential and enthusiasm of his greenhorns. He sees nice things in their future, assuming they see the future from Wesleyan's campus. Because Butterfield knows that keeping the bulk of them together will not easily be done.
``All coaches at all levels have problems keeping a nucleus together,'' Butterfield said. ``In Division I, you have kids transferring all the time. But when you can keep them together, that's the kind of thing that promotes a winning program.''
Butterfield had decent togetherness luck last season, but it led nowhere. Five seniors gave Butterfield plenty of hope for a second consecutive NCAA playoff bid, but the Marlins flopped to an 11-14 finish, and a fifth-place, 9-9 record within the Old Dominion Athletic Conference.
Except for senior point guard David Cohen and six juniors and sophomores, Butterfield this season is casting his lot with the freshmen and diving into the demands and quirks that come with them.
Greater patience from the coach, for instance.
``At times when I've wanted to be impatient and started to rant and rave, I've realized what I'm dealing with here,'' Butterfield said. ``I've tried to let them understand things, but you don't want them to get too comfortable. Anytime you go from high school to any level of college basketball, it's like night and day.''
Four local players are among the freshmen - Blackwell, who didn't play at Manor High School, Indian River's Percy Slight, Lawrence Matthews from Great Bridge and Brad McMurran from Norfolk Collegiate.
Slight, at 6-foot-5, and Blackwell and Russell DeMont, both 6-8, figure to play early and often on Wesleyan's front line, Butterfield said.
Fair or not, the unfamiliar and unproven roster led the conference's coaches to predict an eighth-place finish, out of 10 teams, for Butterfield's bunch.
It's just a harmless little poll, but it irks Butterfield just the same.
``We've never finished lower than sixth, and that was my first year,'' Butterfield said. ``I'm not sure the coaches in the ODAC think a whole lot about us. I hope to turn that around a little bit.''
Sure, Butterfield is optimistic, if not a little eager to start mixing it up. He's going on faith, for now, but one thing about his freshmen he knows - they've reduced the term ``fresh start'' to its most literal sense. ILLUSTRATION: Color photos
BILL TIERNAN/Staff
Virginia Wesleyan's mens basketball team will be built around 10
freshman: seated left to right, Matt Brittingham and Greg Murray,
and standing left to right, Percy Slight, Vic Del Pino, Ryan
Bradford, Sean Blackwell, Russell DeMont, Larry Johnson, Lawrence
Matthews and Brad McMurran. The team also has one senior and six
juniors and sophomores.
``This year, we felt we had to really restock our talent.''
Terry Butterfield, Virginia Wesleyan coach
by CNB