Taking the heat ...

It's hard to believe that the Shaquille of Round Ball may not have too many seasons left in his old kit bag. When you're 7-feet tall and sheathed with 350 pounds of perpetually wounded muscles, you're not going to be mistaken for Fred Astaire.

But you can still be the "Tiger in the Lion's Den," the biography written by the Coach (Dale Brown) who discovered Shaq in Wildflecken, Germany, a couple of decades ago.

At the time, Brown, who was coaching at Louisiana State U., was swinging up and down the German border lecturing the American officers on teamwork and discipline.

He took an instant liking to the boy mountain. He was polite, soft-spoken, and just 13-years-old. He was the son of an American Army sergeant, who wanted his boy to meet the basketball coach. Shaquille had a favor to ask. He was looking for a few leg exercises to use in practice.

That was the beginning of a beautiful friendship, strictly by mail, until Sergeant O'Neal transferred his family to San Antonio, TX.

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When Shaq informed Coach Brown that he was playing in a summer basketball league, the coach told him that he'd be there for the next game.

Brown discovered that the massive kid had turned some of his girth into talent. He could now run and block shots, but he was still raw as a player.

Coach Brown didn't even take a deep breath. He told the boy and his father that he was going to keep in touch with them. He'd get Shaq ready for college and then recruit him for LSU.

And that's exactly what he did ... and even more. After making an All-American player out of Shaq, he allowed him to drop out of LSU and sign with the pros!

It was no mistake. The coach knew exactly what he was doing. He had developed one of the greatest players in the world and was now putting him to work--which would make him an instant millionaire.

One other thing: Brown believed that the college basketball officials could no longer handle a game with big people in it.

Shaq would block a shot, the shooter would fall on the floor, and the ref would call the foul on Shaq.

Big Shaq would look up and the ref would say, "Don't be a cry-baby. Look how big and strong you are. You do not cry in basketball!"

NIT FOR SALE ...

We couldn't believe the brief, bold headline on the bottom of the sport page: "NCAA Buys Out NIT!"

Why couldn't we believe it? Because we had been around ever since both of these basketball tournaments had been invented. The NIT had come first, as an offshoot of the great Madison Square Garden (NY) basketball program founded in 1934.

The NCAA tournament came later, and it was no contest. The NIT had all the glamour and popularity and it stayed that way for a long time.

And then came the disaster--the college basketball scandals of the 1950's. By this time, thanks mostly to the Madison Square Garden programs, basketball had become the second biggest sport (next to soccer) in the world.

The scandals wounded the game, but never came close to killing it. With the coming of the Big East Conference, the game came back strong in the east, though the NIT never regained its popularity.

You'd have to say that the NCAA Tournament took over the collegiate games in the U.S. The questions that now remain are:

How much are the pros going to contribute to our international participation?

Will there be anything like the Dream Team again?

What can we expect from the European teams?

Will David Stern and his saints ever come marching in?

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GETTING THERE ...

Coaches enjoy telling us that losing can be the most depressing happening in their lives, especially if it has a special importance.

The crazy thing about such a loss is that you never know how long the grief is going to last. It could be a day, a week, or a month. But the element of surprise is always there. A veteran coach we know expressed it best:

"Back in the 1990's, I had a terrific run. My team surprised everyone by going all the way to the Final Four before losing.

"It was devastating but, to my surprise, not suicidal. I honestly believe it made me a better coach.

"When I walked into the locker room after the game, I couldn't believe what I saw. The kids were hugging one another and crying: 'What a great year it was! What a great game! We got here and lost--but we got here!'"

"I knew that as a coach, I was expected to say something very meaningful, but there was no way I could do it while looking at all those wonderful faces."

REWARDS OF COACHING ...

In coaching there's a fine line between winning and losing that keeps everyone guessing. The little things can suddenly become big things and the next thing you know you are fighting City Hall ... if you want to call that fighting.

I know that the one time I was suspended, it took me away from coaching for seven years. The kind of years that feel like a century.

My life resumed when a new consolidated high school opened up in my home county and I was offered the head football coaching job.

I never hesitated. First, I needed five years to become eligible for my 25-year retirement pension. Second, I wondered whether I could meet the challenge at my age. Third, I wasn't going to walk away from the thing I loved most in the world--football coaching.

I had missed the camaraderie, the competition, and the people. The smell of the locker room after a game, the only place you could be with all the guys with whom you had worked and planned and accomplished. All those shining faces after you won the big one. The rewards of coaching.

From Doug Barfield, a player at Southern Mississippi and then head coach at Auburn University, as published in Coach. Stackpole Books, PA.