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View Full Version : Another Legend Passes - Jerry Tarkanian



JasonEvans
02-11-2015, 12:04 PM
He wasn't quite as respected as Dean Smith, but Tark the Shark certainly won a lot of games.

RIP.

subzero02
02-11-2015, 12:14 PM
I'll always remember his sideline towel antics. He was a great coach and seemed like genuinely nice person. His amoeba defense could really clamp down on teams.

moonpie23
02-11-2015, 12:33 PM
Passed away at 84 (http://www.espn.com)

Atlanta Duke
02-11-2015, 01:16 PM
This from the LA Times obit

Tarkanian vs. NCAA was the legal version of Ali vs. Frazier — two combatants exchanging blows for decades. The feud’s origins date to the early 1970s when Tarkanian, while coaching Long Beach State, penned critical columns for the local newspaper claiming the NCAA targeted smaller schools.

Tarkanian would later famously quip, “The NCAA is so upset at UCLA they’ll put Northridge on two years’ probation.”

http://www.latimes.com/sports/sportsnow/la-sp-former-unlv-coach-tarkanian-dies-in-las-vegas-20150211-story.html

AIRFORCEDUKIE
02-11-2015, 01:18 PM
I loved tark, no matter where he was. Guy was good for the game and took on the NCAA blow for blow. Also the Tarkanian Basketball school in Las Vegas is a great testament and a lasting tribute to the man, and hopefully it will continue to carry on his legacy.

cspan37421
02-11-2015, 02:16 PM
Tark the Shark has died. Surprised it hasn't led to a thread.

He will be remembered here for a couple things.

1. 103-73. The biggest whipping in an NCAA title game. You know, if you think about it, 73 isn't that few points. I think we won our first title the following year scoring 72. But 103 ... wow.
2. Making a comment that the NCAA was so mad at Kentucky (?) that they would be giving Cleveland State two more years' probation. That's a line that keeps on echoing, a line that still has more than a patina of truth today.

Memory is a funny thing. For years, my memory of the 1990 title game was that of men against boys. I thought CBS had put up some kind of graphic showing the average age of the UNLV lineup (starters, I thought) and compared it to ours. Theirs was something like 23.4, ours was something like 19.4. When the beatdown ensued, it was the one bit of consolation I had. Tark had a lineup of guys getting their third and fourth chances, guys who had been in trouble with the law, etc. That was how my memory formed.

Years later I went back and tried to verify the age thing at least. I couldn't do it. IIRC, I found that they were indeed older, but the age gap wasn't nearly that severe. And as for who really had a rap sheet, I didn't try to check on that, esp. after the age thing didn't seem to pan out. Perhaps someone really did report that age stuff and it wasn't true, or accurate. I don't know.

At least we got a W against them the following year. Hardly a whipping in return, but as they were going for a perfect season, it was as sweet as if it was a whipping. Amazing we didn't have a letdown against Kansas, because that UNLV final was really the best game that weekend.

Well, he won a lot of games, he obviously could recruit and coach. He reminded me of Uncle Fester with his look. Any other memories of Jerry?

Olympic Fan
02-11-2015, 02:29 PM
I was in Denver in 1990 and I remember how the media kept trying to portray to story as good (Duke wasn't hated in those days) vs. evil (UNLV).

I remember that K would have none of it. Don't remember the exact quote, but it was something along the lines of "I know we do things the right way, but we're not the only ones." He never said a negative thing about Tark or Vegas before or after the beatdown.

Tark, of course, was famously battling the NCAA. Another of his great lines is that he loved to get transfer students, because they already had their cars. Did he break rules? Almost certainly and he did it knowingly and in contempt of the NCAA. When he was punished, he took the NCAA to court to fight their punishment. He had teams on probation at Long Beach State and UNLV. Not sure about Fresno state in his later years.

I have always had a theory about where his contempt for the NCAA came from. I was doing some research on the 1972 Final Four and I saw to my surprise, that the NCAA coaches were outraged that FSU coach Hugh Durham -- one of the most notorious cheaters in college basketball -- would be competing for the national title. The single most outspoken coach was Jerry Tarkanian of Long Beach State. His response was something like "if the NCAA is not going to penalize Durham, then what's the point of the rest of us trying to follow the rules?"

I think he took that lesson to heart.

He did care for his kids and he was a great coach. That's not a bad legacy. RIP.

OldPhiKap
02-11-2015, 03:50 PM
A great innovator and molder of talent. Certainly unique.

Prayers to the family.