THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1997, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, February 5, 1997 TAG: 9702050691
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C1 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Column
SOURCE: Bob Molinaro
LENGTH: 70 lines
Why doesn't Tim Duncan pick on somebody his own size? He's just too big and talented for the other kids on the block. A sport that's going through an obvious talent recession can't handle him.
When he's controlling the action under both backboards against undergraduates who will need a ticket to get into an NBA game, the Wake Forest center is like a teamster playing with toy trucks.
By now, Duncan should be wearing a Boston Celtics uniform. With Boston, he could find real competition, though probably not in practice.
Seeing as how Duncan plays in the ACC, the country's toughest conference, it's embarrassing how little competition he faces most nights.
College basketball has always had its skyscrapers. But the regional landscape over which Duncan towers is dotted with strip malls.
Without question, Duncan is a refreshing change from your garden-variety millionaire-to-be. He is a supremely talented athlete secure enough in his self-image to postpone the glamor and big bucks of the NBA.
And Wake Forest coach Dave Odom is perfectly right when he says that a 20-year-old is better served in college than he would be by hanging out in hotels with 30-year-old men.
Duncan, along with undefeated Kansas, is the best thing about college basketball this season. Off the court, he carries himself with a quiet dignity that is unusual among today's top players.
Still, he presents a problem for his sport. The unavoidable complaints about college basketball this season center on the talent drought. There aren't enough stars or well-balanced teams. A dominating Duncan only increases our awareness of the dilemma.
The best players Duncan would have encountered in the paint have left for the pros. Joe Smith. Rasheed Wallace. Even Jerry Stackhouse.
Now he toys with the likes of Duke's Greg Newton and Maryland's Obinna Ekezia, who fouled out Saturday against Duncan in only 15 minutes of play.
Maryland is no pushover, either, at least not by '97 standards. The Terps rank 7th in the latest AP poll despite two losses last week.
Gary Williams' team is quick and scrappy. But only within the new reality of college basketball could anyone envision them as Top 10 material.
``The great programs (recruit) the great players and they leave early,'' says Williams. ``All of a sudden the teams that recruit good players are as good as the teams that recruit great players who leave.''
Going strictly on performance, Maryland is doing as well as it did when Joe Smith was in a Terps uniform. But nobody who follows the game is fooled by the rankings and records.
When Duncan trashes the pros - ``I never watch NBA games. I'm not interested. It's just boring.'' - he echoes a traditional complaint usually voiced by college coaches and fans.
It's ironic, then, that the college game has evolved into the jayvee version of the NBA. Dunks and 3-pointers. Rules changes to promote entertainment. More emphasis on power at the expense of finesse, fundamentals and strategy.
The result: Too many college games deteriorate into a bad impersonation of pro games. The situation is aggravated now because of the dilution of talent on campus.
This is the sport that Duncan rules. He is the best player in a game that can't hang on to its brightest talents. He is the reason Wake Forest is among the elite.
You wonder, though, if he has been challenged enough for his own good. Duncan is more than just college basketball's player of the year.
He is Gulliver in Lilliput. ILLUSTRATION: Color photo by ASSOCIATED PRESS
Wake Forest center Tim Duncan is a supremely talented athlete secure
enough in his self-image to postpone the glamor and big bucks of the
NBA.