Still crazy after all these years

… elevated Penn State women’s basketball to great heights On Jan. 2, 2002, I first met Rene Portland, the head basketball coach at Penn State. She brought her team 65 miles west to Loretto, Pa., for a game with the St. Francis Red Flash women. It was the first time that I had seen the Lady Lions in person. Despite being an alumnus, I had not paid a great deal of attention to the basketball programs at Penn State. So, my first question was simple: Why, coach, did you bring your Big Ten team to the home of a small, Northeast Conference school when most coaches would not risk being upset in such a situation? When she answered, I realized how charming, charismatic, appealing, articulate, and intelligent she was. She turned her charm offensive on me, and it worked. I was thoroughly impressed and realized why she would eventually win 606 games in her 27-year Penn State career, 72 percent of her games, along with five Big Ten championships and six Atlantic-10 crowns. Portland again brought ...

... we will never know He was supposed to be the foundation of the next Steel Curtain, just the way another Texan, Mean Joe Greene, had been for the Pittsburgh Steelers in 1969. Then on Oct. 20, 1983, Gabe Rivera was involved in a horrible accident in Ross Township near Pittsburgh. His Datsun 280-ZX was involved in an accident with another car, and Rivera was thrown out the rear window. He was not wearing a seat belt and was beyond the legal limit for intoxication. Rivera suffered a traumatic injury to his spine and was paralyzed from the chest down. He passed away last week at the age of 57, a sad situation for a player who came to the Steelers with the 21st pick of a 1983 draft that was replete with NFL hall-of-famers. At Texas Tech, Rivera compiled 321 tackles, 34 tackles for loss, and 14 sacks. He played just six games for the Steelers, recording two sacks. In 2012, he was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame, but he often surmised what might have been without the ac...

 … Stan Bem cared more for power than for athletes When an organization has no accountability and no oversight, particularly when it is one that administers young people in educational institutions, problems are certain to ensue. That has occurred with the Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic Association (PIAA) over the past 50 years, and probably before that. Consequently, it has been in trouble over the years. Yet, because no one looks over their shoulders, it becomes an autocratic, practically dictatorial group. However, now the people in power at the grassroots have rebelled, and the leader of the PIAA, executive director Bob Lombardi, is shaking in his boots. Things are so bad that a group that is meeting next week in State College to push for reform — or dissolution — of the PIAA. The Equity Summit The summit of schools across Pennsylvania will attract administrators and other educators who are interested in fairness in athletics in the state. They are outraged that publ...

… want to disband PIAA and fire Lombardi The PIAA attempted a fourth-quarter comeback this week, but the organization that presently controls athletes at high schools in Pennsylvania’s used a deflated ball that landed with a thud. The organization is under attack from public school superintendents who want to level the playoff playing field for high school teams. PIAA Executive Director Bob Lombardi, whom the superintendents want to fire, tried to orchestrate a compromise, but the Hail Mary pass did not even reach the end zone. They did tighten the transfer rules somewhat, and they tried to concoct a “competitive-balance formula that will force the most successful football and basketball teams into a higher classification if that team also received an unusually large number of transfers.” Those are not the contentious issues The superintendents will meet next week in what is being billed as a “PIAA Playoff Equity Summit,” one that almost all public schools support. This will take pla...

… a cancer on the team Many outlets are reporting that the Pittsburgh Steelers refused to offer running back Le’Veon Bell a new contract, but that is not the case. According to Ian Rapoport of NFL.com, that is not the case. The Steeler offer was declined by Bell on Monday prior to the deadline, and he will again be the franchise player for the team. Rapoport tweeted this: “From what I understand, the #Steelers ’ final offer to RB Le’Veon Bell was 5 years, $70M with more than $30M over 2 years. Last year, the offer was 5 years, $60M. ... Instead, he’ll earn $14.5M on another franchise tag.” CBS Sports then added a reason for the denial: “Although the offer would have given Bell the largest multi-year contract of any running back in the NFL, he turned it down, and one reason he likely did that, is because it was nowhere near his asking price, which was reportedly in the neighborhood of $17 million per season .” Talented but troubled Bell is a very talented young player, rushing for 1,2...

Len Chappell in the Final Four  … passed away on Thursday at 77 Great athletes abound in the United States. Those who were great athletes but also great people are not as common. Yet, Len Chappell was both, and a few stories will explain why that is the case. I was fortunate to have interviewed Len on three occasions, and I came away with a portrait of the man, not just the athlete. Born in the Martindale area of Portage Township, Chappell was blessed with physical skills, growing to 6-feet, 8-inches and about 240 pounds when he finally took the floor as a Demon Deacon at Wake Forest in 1958. Chappell left his mark at Portage, scoring an incredible 977 points in his senior season, 2,240 in three years for Coach Jim Hess. He led the Mustangs into the nationally-known War Memorial Invitational Tournament in his senior season, matching up against one of the most powerful schools in Pennsylvania, Overbrook, in the opening game. Overbrook featured its own big star, Wayne Hightower, an...

... Is the PIAA an endangered species? John Sarandrea understands the angst of people in public schools across Pennsylvania. And he has been so disgusted that he decided to take the issue into his own hands and try to change it. The issue is this: Should public schools that are constrained by boundaries have to compete athletically in the state playoffs with private, non-boundary schools that can recruit players from just about anywhere? Sarandrea worked with the Western Pa. Interscholastic Athletic League (WPIAL) to send out a questionnaire to schools asking for their opinions. The WPIAL schools overwhelmingly want separate playoffs for public, boundary schools and private, non-boundary schools. “I’m hoping that the other districts in Pennsylvania will take a look at this survey and are willing to distribute it to their member schools as well,” Sarandrea told the New Castle News in May. “I can’t tell you how many people have contacted me, how many superintendents across the stat...

 … does not mention revenue-sharing or boredom The Boston Red Sox are experiencing a banner season, one that could conceivably lead them to the World Series in a few months. They have won 62 games, 33 over .500, and are leading the venerable New York Yankees by two games in the American League-East. What Dan Shaughnessy is frustrated with is that Boston fans wish to talk more about the Celtics or Patriots than the Red Sox.  Why aren’t the Sox generating more interest? After the Sox swept the Kansas City Royals in three games over the weekend, outscoring the last place, 25-64 KC team, by scoring 32 runs to their 13, the writer pointed out that this is not just a Boston phenomenon. “This isn’t exactly breaking news, but as great as the Sox weekend was, as scalding hot as the Sox are now, my takeaway is that Major League Baseball is in trouble. And as much as I love the game, I can no longer defend all the things that are hurting the sport,” Shaughnessy wrote in the Bosto...

... master motivator vs. cocky player Jerome Bettis was preparing for one of the greatest awards of his life three years ago. However, he could not forget one of the most humbling comments that a football coach ever made to him. Bettis, preparing for his induction into the National Football League (Hall of Fame), had to remind himself was Notre Dame Coach Lou Holtz said about him in 1991. I interviewed Holtz in Ligonier earlier that summer, and while I asked him about how his team would do, I did not know much about Bettis at the time. Neither did anyone else. Bettis was an unproven player, though well known in his hometown of Detroit and throughout Michigan. The master motivator, somewhat of a con man Holtz was a master motivator, and he realized that he had to bring Bettis down a notch in order for him to work hard. According to ESPN, Holtz criticized him in a team meeting, “telling all the players and coaches that there was a cocky player on the roster who could become a team canc...

… MLB down significantly When the Pirates traded Andrew McCutchen, their most popular player and the symbol of their resurgence in the 2010s, and also traded Gerrit Cole, currently one of the leading pitchers in the NL, a former number 1 pick, the fans were outraged. More than 28,000 petitioned MLB to have owner Robert Nutting removed, which did not happen.  Instead, the fans appear to be following through on one of their other pledges: to boycott the team. According to a story in last week’s Post-Gazette by Elizabeth Bloom, the Pirates are heading for one of the worst seasons in recent history in terms of attendance. “If attendance doesn’t pick up over the summer, the Pirates are on pace to have their lowest attendance in PNC Park history and their worst since 1996,” Bloom wrote about the team, which is now averaging just 17,138 fans, according to baseball-reference.com. That is a drop of 27.5 percent over the same period last year, Bloom wrote.  According to B...