RAINBOW BASKETBALL
STAR-BULLETIN FILE PHOTOS 1987
Reggie Cross was named Most Outstanding Player on the first two Hawaii teams coached by Riley Wallace and is still the last player taken in the NBA Draft (76ers, second round) out of UH.
|
|
First team views Wallace fondly
"A grumpy guy" initially, he became "a teddy bear" and father figure to many
It's been nearly two decades, but Reggie Cross' initial impressions of Riley Wallace remain vivid.
"When I first met him I thought he was a mean, grumpy guy," Cross recalled.
"But then once I got to know him he was just a teddy bear inside."
Cross was among the Rainbow Warriors already in the Hawaii basketball program wondering what direction the team would take when Wallace was hired as UH's 17th head coach in June 1987.
The transition wasn't exactly silky, as the Rainbows endured a 4-25 initial season under Wallace. But several of the players who endured that first season combined with a strong recruiting class to post the biggest turnaround in the nation in 1988-89 and set the foundation for Wallace's 20-year tenure that ends with the conclusion of this season.
"I knew the team had only won four games the year before," said Vincent Smalls, part of the junior-college influx that keyed the reversal. "I talked to some of the guys when we went out there for the recruiting trip and they said it would be nice to be part of a team that could set a tradition, that could come in and rebuild the program from the ground up. I didn't know what to expect when we got there, but it turned out to be a great season for us."
The Hawaii basketball program had languished to an 11-45 mark during two years under Frank Arnold, who abruptly left to take an assistant coaching job at Arizona State after the 1986-87 season.
Bob Nash, an assistant under Arnold, had worked with Wallace on Larry Little's UH staff in the early 1980s and alerted the Seminole (Okla.) Junior College coach to the opening. The new era in Hawaii basketball began when athletic director Stan Sheriff introduced Wallace as the Rainbows' new coach on June 19, 1987.
Among Wallace's first acts was to retain Nash as an assistant, a combination that has been in place ever since.
The timing of Wallace's hire meant the roster was already in place when he arrived, and the players quickly sensed the fire Wallace brought to the job.
"You could already tell there was a new sheriff in town, big time," said guard David Hallums, a transfer to UH from Brigham Young-Hawaii.
"When I first met him you could see he just brought an intensity that I enjoyed because he didn't put up with anything. ... When he first came in, and I was there from Day 1, guys just quit. Literally, they left the island."
Among those who had to adjust to Wallace's vocal coaching style was Chris Gaines. The lanky guard was the Rainbows' leading scorer as a freshman and went on to become the program's all-time leading scorer. But he didn't get cut any slack as the new head man pushed the 'Bows through physical practices.
"Chris used to get beat up by everybody," said Hallums, Gaines' roommate at the time. "He used to get frustrated -- he would throw the ball, he'd walk out of the gym, come back in. But he got tougher and slowly he got Coach Wallace's respect for digging in.
"When he started getting knocked around during the games, it was nothing because in practice it was like football practice sometimes."
Wallace hardly eased into his new role as the Rainbows began his inaugural season with a road trip to Vanderbilt and Kentucky, losing by a combined 56 points. The Rainbows then lost their home opener to Pacific before 1,631 fans.
His first win came against Loyola, Md., 102-69, on Dec. 21, 1987. There would be only three more the rest of the season, including a home win over nationally ranked New Mexico.
Along the way numbers dwindled. The 'Bows pulled volleyball players Mike Among and Adam Lockwood into duty. Chris Roscoe, a star receiver on the football team, also made a brief appearance.
Still, there were signs of progress and they ended the season by beating Air Force in the opening round of the Western Athletic Conference tournament and putting a serious scare into top-seeded Brigham Young before losing 76-74.
"I wish I could go back and coach them now with what I've learned as a coach," Wallace said. "They were learning the offense just like I was because it was new for us. ... The good thing about them was they got better every night. We were all growing together."
STAR-BULLETIN FILE PHOTOS 1988
Vincent Smalls joined the Rainbow Warriors in Wallace's second season, when UH had the biggest turnaround in the country.
|
|
The seeds of the turnaround would be planted in the offseason, as the UH staff -- with Cross and Hallums serving as player hosts -- restocked the roster with junior-college transfers and a heralded prep guard from Connecticut.
"I wanted to come out there and do something different," said Phil Lott, who went on to score 1,290 points over the next four years. "I wanted to try to get out there and try to build the program up. ... I can always say I was one of the first ones, to be able to be on the ground floor when Wallace came and starting that whole tradition."
With Smalls and Terry Houston joining Cross in the frontcourt, the Rainbows now had a rugged presence in the middle to go along with a backcourt that returned Hallums and Gaines (who was declared academically ineligible midway through the season) and added Lott and Troy Bowe.
UH exceeded its win total from the previous year seven games into Wallace's second season, but it wasn't until the 'Bows pulled out a 72-69 win over Purdue in the semifinals of the Rainbow Classic that he truly felt the program had arrived.
"The game that sticks out more than any game probably for me was Purdue in the Rainbow Classic," Wallace said. "Sheriff hit me at center court with that big bear hug, it was like he was telling me, 'I think we're going to turn the corner.' "
The Rainbows lost the title game to an Illinois team that advanced to the Final Four, and went on to finish 17-13. The campaign was highlighted by three wins over rival BYU and the first of two consecutive National Invitation Tournament berths as the program returned to the postseason for the first time since 1974.
Cross was named the team's most outstanding player both of his seasons at UH and was a second-round selection of the Philadelphia 76ers in 1989. He now owns a car dealership and runs a limousine service in Florida and remains the last Hawaii player to be picked in the NBA Draft.
"I have a lot of memories and friends still there and people who helped me along the way," said Cross, now a father of five and a grandfather. "I really miss Hawaii. Hawaii was really a great place for me -- not only with my basketball career, but also just as a person and a citizen."
Hallums is now an officer in the Honolulu Police Department, and Smalls and Lott (who played 10 seasons in Europe) are middle-school counselors in their East Coast hometowns. And they still keep up with the Rainbows when they can.
"I watch them all the time when they play on ESPN late at night," Smalls said from his Philadelphia home. "Seeing Coach Nash's son out there playing, that's real nice. I remember little Bobby was running around the weight room with us and we had to go get him all the time because he was into everything. Now seeing him out there playing on the floor, I really get a kick out of that."
Said Lott: "People here ask me, 'Your coach still there?' and I'm like, 'Yup, he's still there.' "
While Wallace built on those early years to turn the program into a consistent winner and a profitable wing of the athletic department, his players applied the sometimes-hard lessons on the court to their post-college lives.
"One thing I'm always going to remember about what he stood for was just to be a man," Hallums said. "Take care of your family, take care of yourself, and just be a man out here and don't let anybody tell you you can't do certain things.
"I never had any structure, and just being at UH and playing for Coach Wallace, he brought that part of it. ... The work ethic is something I'm always going to remember and he was a man of his word. He said if you work hard, you're going to play."
Through The Years
Riley Wallace's win-loss record each year:
|
Overall |
WAC
|
|
W |
L |
W |
L
|
1987-88 |
4 |
25 |
2 |
14
|
1988-89^ |
17 |
13 |
9 |
7
|
1989-90^ |
25 |
10 |
10 |
6
|
1990-91 |
16 |
13 |
7 |
9 |
|
1991-92 |
16 |
12 |
9 |
7 |
|
1992-93 |
12 |
16 |
7 |
11
|
1993-94* |
18 |
15 |
11 |
7
|
1994-95 |
16 |
13 |
8 |
10 |
|
1995-96 |
10 |
18 |
7 |
11
|
1996-97^ |
21 |
8 |
12 |
4
|
1997-98^ |
21 |
9 |
8 |
6
|
1998-99 |
6 |
20 |
3 |
11
|
1999-2000 |
17 |
12 |
5 |
9
|
2000-01* |
17 |
14 |
8 |
8
|
2001-02* |
27 |
6 |
15 |
3
|
2002-03^ |
19 |
12 |
9 |
9
|
2003-04^ |
21 |
12 |
11 |
7
|
2004-05 |
16 |
13 |
7 |
11
|
2005-06 |
17 |
11 |
10 |
6
|
2006-07 |
17 |
12 |
7 |
8
|
TOTAL |
333 |
264 |
165 |
164 |
* -- Reached NCAA Tournament
^ -- Invited to NIT
Numbers Game
Some significant figures during Wallace's 20-year tenure (entering today's game vs. Boise State):
1 Win needed to tie Vince Goo as UH's winningest basketball coach
2 Highest ranked opponent defeated (Kansas, 1997)
3 NCAA Tournament appearances & WAC Coach of the Year awards
5 Seasons with 20-plus wins
6 NIT appearances
8 Rainbow Classic championships & consecutive winning seasons
9 1,000-point-plus scorers
12 First-team All-WAC picks & seasons with at least 17 wins
14 Players named academic All-WAC
20 Schools that have left or joined the WAC
22 States the Rainbows played in
49 Head coaches to serve in the WAC (including interim)
102 Points UH scored in Wallace's first win (vs. Loyola-Md.)
132 Letter-winners
165 WAC victories
597 Games as UH head coach, 333-264 (missed three due to medical reasons and ejected from two)
42,786 Points scored by UH