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Opportunity Knocks
STORY TOOLS 
More from Other News |
 CURLEY |
Part 1: Out-of-state players get in the game
) |
Each fall, the 1.7 million community college students in the
country's largest system of higher education are joined by about 250
out-of-state basketball players. They annually comprise about 20
percent of the combined rosters of the state's 92 community college
men's basketball programs, even though the Commission on Athletics'
constitution is designed to limit their presence. Although coaches are
not allowed to make first contact with recruits outside state borders,
it doesn't mean coaches surrender their competitive impulses.
Full story
ADDITIONAL
COVERAGE
Rules: Stretching the
boundaries
VC mindful of its troubled
past
Schools near affordable housing have
advantage in securing top talent
About the author
GRAPHICS
GRAPHIC: Where players come from
GRAPHIC: Places producing California's
community college players
GRAPHIC: Percentage of out-of-state
recruits by sport
GRAPHIC: Map of California community
colleges
) |
Standing grand on Bedford Avenue like the proud elderly lady
that watches over the neighborhood from a third-story window, the
Bedford-Stuyvesant YMCA is the brick depot at which more than a third
of the 30 New York City natives on California Community College men's
basketball rosters earn their westward ticket. Thomas McTernan is
responsible for about half that number. "What we do here," he said, "is
to help the local kids get back on track."
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ADDITIONAL
COVERAGE
Third-party system rules the
game
California junior college basketball
players from New York
) |
Jerel Blassingame and Rashien Little are using California
community colleges to straighten their lives out. Both high school
dropouts, they are dribbling on the path initially blazed by a New York
coach and Indiana Pacer Jamaal Tinsley, who became an NBA first-round
draft pick in 2001 after playing for Mount San Jacinto from 1996 to
1998 and for Iowa State from 1998 to 2001.
Full story
ADDITIONAL
COVERAGE
Street-corner culture absent in
California
Atkinson not the typical JC
player
Cabagnot sheds a
stereotype
) |
At the end of a cul-de-sac stitched into the rural patchwork
of the San Joaquin Valley, the man who has won more college basketball
games than any other coach answers the door. As 72-year-old retirees
are apt to do, Jerry Tarkanian is kicking back. His peers call him the
most misunderstood coach in the history of the game. It is time to see
if they are right.
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ADDITIONAL
COVERAGE
Tarkanian's record
Many cherish time spent at JC
level
) |
Jerel Blassingame and Rashien Little are using California
community colleges to straighten their lives out. Both high school
dropouts, they are dribbling on the path initially blazed by a New York
coach and Indiana Pacer Jamaal Tinsley, who became an NBA first-round
draft pick in 2001 after playing for Mount San Jacinto from 1996 to
1998 and for Iowa State from 1998 to 2001.
Full story
) |
After holding firm to tradition for decades, the Commission on
Athletics redefined its re-cruiting rules in March 2000. But for many
California coaches and administrators who had been anticipating reform
from the COA, the step was not quite large enough. Section 2.5.1 of the
COA constitution still reads simply, "Out-of-state recruiting is
prohibited."
Full story
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