News Scrapbook 1984

SAN DI GO UNION rinceton ends it for USD, 65-56

Los Angeles, CA (Los Angeles Co.) Times (San Diego Ed.)

Los Angeles, CA (Los Angeles Co.) Los Angeles Times (Cir. D. 1,072,500) (Cir. sun. 1,358,420)

(D. 50,010) (S. 55,573)

Mullin claws for game-high 38 By Chris Jenkins Staff Wriler PHILADELPHIA - This Ivy was poison. The University of San Diego had never encountered a team quite like Princeton, or a player quite like Kevin Mullin, the Tigers' all-Ivy League forward. But then, neither had the Toreros ever been to the NCAA tournament. It was a brief one for USO, which last night fell 65-56 to Princeton in a prelimi- nary round game at the Palestra and saw the last page closed on its fairy-tale season. And Mullin? He was the one left holding the pumpkin, casually tossing 1t in the air. Indeed, perhaps not since Bill Bradley has a Princetonian produced a game like the one USD endured from Mullin, who had a career-high 38 points against a team that had made it to the NCAAs by playing tre- mendous defense and not allowing even 30 points to one player this season. The Toreros tried everything short of a whip and chair agamst the Tiger, and still Mullin sank 12 of 15 field goals and 14 of 16 free throws. As time ran out on the Toreros, the Princeton fans in a crowd of 4,314 began chanting "Salt Lake City," which is where the Tigers are headed for a game against Nevada-Las Vegas tomorrow. USD, the West Coast Athletic Conference champion, returns home with an 18-10 record and the question whether Jim Bro- velli has coached his last game at Alcala Park. Brovelli, wooed heavily by the Uni- versity of San Francisco, said a decision is

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p C. 8 I 888 Southland's Only .NCAATourneyTeam Makes ~ick Exit By DAV~11TEL, Times Staff Writer PHILADELPH1A-Umversi1._L_ of San Diego Coach Jim Brovelli knew that the Princet.on Tigers would be frustratingly deliberate on offense and tenaciously stingy on defense, and they were. But there was more: Junior forward Kevin Mullin, who broke loose for 38 points and led the Tigers t.o a 65-56 win Tuesday mght in the opening round of the NCAA basketball tourna- ment at The Palestra. Thus, USD's first Division 1 playoff appearance was short and not so sweet. Southern Cahforrua's only entry m the NCAA tourney was out. Nothing dramatic. Princet.on simply took control and kept It. It was about as exciting, 10 fact, as reading a telephone book-or driving through an icy ram to get here. The game was as dismal, for USD, as the d~. When it ended, USD's star forward, Mike Whitmarsh, was on the bench with an ankle he twisted with 1,16 t.o play. It was no way to end a career, simply watching the seconds tick painfully away. "What hurts," Whitmarsh said, "is that I know we could have done so much better." USD likes to play a deliberate game, but It 18 a run-and-gun outfit compared t.o Princet.on. The Torero , when they set up in ti1eir half-court offense, like t.o play a balanced ~e inside and outside. However, Princeton's 3-2 zone totally shut down USD's mside game. "They packed the three guys across the front and had those o~~er r-'YS down low," said USD guard John Prunty. Youd get to the top of the key and look inside and there'd never be an opening." USD, as a consequence, had to rely almost exclusively on its outside shooting. Center Scott Thompson and power fo~ard Anthony Reuss hardly ever saw the ball, Reuss taking four shots and scoring seven points and Thompson takmg three shots and scoring four points. .. "They did a great job defensively," said Brovelli. They took Reuss and Scott right out of the game." And Whitmarsh, who leads the Toreros in virtually everything, scored 17 points, but could not comfortably play the total game he is capable of playing. "I never had a chance to play my game," he said. Mullin w:15_ playing more than his game for the Tigers. He had 22 pomt.s m the frrst half alone as Princeton built up a 33-24 lead. Like so many other fellows named Mullin, he 1s known as Moon. "And," said Pete Carril, Princeton's veteran coach "the moon was hot tonight." ' Mullin was an unpleasant surprise to USO, which was not able_ to obtain ~ny tapes of Pnnceton playing. In preparation, s~ovelli had to rely on the observations of other coaches. No one mentioned Mullin's quickness so Brovelli tried t.o defend against him. with Reuss, a power forward, when he needed the qwckness of a small forward or big guard. By the time he made the adjustment, Princeton was ahead. "That," Brovelli said, "was what we couldn't let happen. It's tough to come back against a team that takes care of the ball as well as Princeton does." USO led only once, 3-2, on a three-point play by ~1tmarsh less than two minutes int.o the game. Princeton ran off a string of seven straight points, five by John Smyth and two by Mullin, and the Toreros were to ~nd the remainder of the evening in fruitless purswt. Miss~ free. throws, rarely a USD problem, were costly m the frrst half. It was six-of-11 from the free throw line in the first half, and made the only two it shot in the second half. However, when Prunty hit from the top of the key to cut the Princeton lead to 26-22, the Toreros seemed to be within striking distance. Mullin took over and hit a dri"!11g lay-up, converted a free throw, hit another drivmg lay- up and finally two more free throws "We went through one of those spells," C~I said, "and then Moon Mullin-Superman-came to our rescue and he was ternfic." For the Toreros, trailing at the half was not a new exper1en_ce. Th~y were behind in the second half of each of the SIX strrught games they won to win the West Coast Athletic Conference championship. "It's ~u~h..to corn; back when you're down nine," · But_ the Toreros did stir a bit. They made a mini. run t.o get w1thm five, 47-42, but Princeton made 12 of 14 free throws in the last 3,50 to protect the lead. "-Y,.e had t.o live or die with the outside shot," Whitmarsh said. "And we died with it." Prunty, the Toreros' best outside shooter was five of 12 f~r 10 points. Al Moscatel, another norn'.tally steady' outside shooter, was three of 11. . ''.We've got to hit a few from outside to open up the ms1de," Prun~y said, "but we were never able to get into a rhythm torught. We never scored many times in a row. We never got on a roll." . ~nd so it.is back to San Diego for the Toreros who f1rushed therr season with a record of 18-10. They had hoped to make a stop in Salt Lake City for a Thursday night da~e with Nevada Las Vegas, but Princeton (19-9) will be there instead. -~~---~~---L f .I. Brovelh said, but wed done it before." Not this lime. No second half miracle.

P C. B 1888 Students Bored by ig Game ByTJMGid-9# SAN DIEGO-Students at the Uniyersity o~ Diego reverted to form 7riiesaay night. At a time when they might have been che ring the fortunes of the Torero bask 1ball tea!l'! they chose, instead, to conc(!ntrate on their studies. The fact that U D's first NCAA D1v1Sion I playoff appearance came in Philadelphia was pa t of problem, but even tel vi ion cov rage of the game against Princeton caused httie excit ment on campus. lntramurals were cancelled so that students could watch the game on cable telcv1s1on in their dorms. •At game time, however the sleepy campus student housing area was, well, sleepy. On the all-male econd floor of San Miguel Hall, a three-story dorm that houses 96 students, 25 students assembled in the television room to watch the Torero bemg beaten by the Tigers, 65-56. There was no partying, and 1t wasn't Just the score that was the caWle of that. This week holds mid-term exams for most of the students and the telecast was little mor than an excuse to set the books aside for a while. The game wc1s two minutes old before the partisan fans started yelling loudly enough to distract two backgammon players, who folded up their bo rd and joined those m front of the screen. The Viewers, only two of whom thought prior to the game that Princeton would win, had their spirits damp- t'ned when USD fell to a nine-point deficit by halftime. There were plenty of wisecracks, Pl ase • ee STUDENTS:r •re 9 ' "

still on hold.

Associated Press

See USO on Page D-2

USD: Princeton finishes Toreros Continued from Page D-1

said, at the foul line. He estimated that instead of trailing by nine (33-24) at halftime, the Toreros might have been within one if not for three missed first shots on the front ends of one-and-one situations. The best thing USD did the entire first half was to get Princeton play- maker Bill Ryan off the floor - and even that backfired. Also an all-Ivy pick, Ryan departed little more than eight minutes into the game with his third foul, not to return until after intermission. For the same reason Princeton was also without 6-9 cen'. ter Howard Levy for the last 4:25 of the first half. As it turned out, though, that just placed more responsibility on Mullin. Indeed, he scored 15 of the Tigers' last 17 pomts before halftime. Trailing 16-9 when Ryan left, USD made 1t 16-13 on a missile by Mosca- tel and free throws by Whitmarsh and Anthony Reuss, only to watch helplessly as the whirling Mullin reeled off five straight points. The Toreros surged back to 29-22 and Mullin produced a three-point play. "Our offense doesn't run as well with Billy out," Mullin said later adding that he took things i~to bis own hands because "I didn't want this to be the last game of my ca- reer." Mullin rem · t e ' main man when Ryan and Levy returned, bumpmg the Princeton lead to 41-28 on a shot from underneath and anoth- er from way outside. Brovelli as- signed Reuss to him, then Mark Bos- tic, to no avail. Brovelli bade no farewells after- ward, just telling his players "to keep their heads up, that we had a great season." Besides, they probably wouldn't have believed it in Seattle anyway. • • • Gonzaga's John Stockton, who averaged 20.9 points and 7.2 assists per game, has been named most valuable player of the West Coast Athletic Conference basketball sea- son. Others on the team were Forrest McKenzie and Keith Smith of Loyola Marymount, Victor Anger of Pepper- dine, David Boone and Paul Pickett of St. Mary's, Mike Whitmarsh and Anthony Reuss of USD, and Nick Vanos and Harold Keeling of Santa Clara. USO's Scott Thompson was named freshman player of the year.

"I'm going to spend some time with this team for a few days," he said. "I'm close to them and they're close to each other. I'm not even going to think about anything else until I've completed the season. To- night doesn't finish it with me." What finished the Toreros last night was their somewhat dismal shooting performance from both the field and the free-throw line. But mostly it was Mullin and Princeton's 3-2 zone. Trying to get anything inside on Princeton's de- fense was like trying for a tan in stormy Philadelphia. Mullin supplied the burn. "He's a clever ballplayer," said forward Mike Whitmarsh, the top USD scorer with 17 points but frus- trated nonetheless and hurt further by a swollen ankle that sidelined him for the game's last 1:16. "He drives and drives and does a great job of drawing fouls. And he's got really good body control." Brovelli and Whitmarsh agreed that the Toreros have seen better players than Mullin this season but the USD coach said what makes' him especially effective is the way he fits into Princeton's ultradeliberate of- fensive scheme. "We really didn't play a team like that, that passed the ball around, that went backdoor, that scored so many layups," said Whitmarsh. "They had a lot of layups." ~onversely, Princeton gave up few pomts from underneath. Princeton knew about as much about USD as USO knew about Princeton, which was almost nil, but the Tigers were determined to keep the Toreros out- side. "They really packed in the paint," Whitmarsh said. "Once we got it in- side, they'd slap it away ... Every time I tried to penetrate or penetrate and dish, they shut it off. It was tough to even get a pass in there." "The frustrating part was that we weren't hitting the outside shots we were taking," said John Prunty, with 10 pomts the only other Torero in double figures. "Even when we hit it didn't open up the zone. They w~re content to let us shoot." Prunty and Al Moscatel, USD's other designated sharpshooter, hit only eight of 23 attempts, most!y from outside. USO first got into trouble, Brovelli

Continued from P11e 1 most of them aimed at Princeton Coach Pete Carril, but the s udents could only watch as Princeton forward Kevin Mullin sing I - handedly dismantled USD. "I would have liked to see us go one more round," Dan Lynch, a freshman from St Paul, Minn,, said. "It's more of a letdown because I thought we could win one and then lose to a good team. I've seen all of our home games and 1thought could have beaten Princeton." Junior Jerr GI maker Crom San Francisco, who plays on th U D football team agreed. '.'I ?,ldn't thmk the game wo~ld be this one-sided," he said. I thought we would at least put up a couple of runs and lead once or twice. "I think they were Just nervous playing in front of the TV cameras. I don't know if they will get a chance to do this (go to the tournament) again." ~ut Bill Englar, a freshman from Seattle, was more ph1losoph1cal. 'Tm d1s?ppomted that they didn't win, but the morale of the school was up for the first time since I've been here," Englar said. "I thought they played good but they should have gone inside more. I thought Prm~eton was really really good."

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Arizona 22• USD 1 - Chip Hale went 5-for-7 with a two-run homer to help Arizona overwhelm the host Toreros (ll· l 2•1). Hale was one hit short of the Arizona school record for a single game. Designated hitter D~vid Cooper had two two-run doubles for the Wildcats (12-17) USD's Matt Francis (2-2) was tagged for the loss. . ·

lated Pr Torero Al Moscatel tries to guard Isaac Carter. Below, USD's Chris Carr dives to try to steal the ball from Tiger Carter. After USD's defeat, USO Athletic Director Father Patrick Cahill consoles Chris Carr. (above) Princeton's

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THE TRIBUNE

DAILY CALI FORNIAN MAR 1 4 1984

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POISONIVY The University of San Diego Toreros found the Ivy League champion Princeton Tigers too ~uch to handle Tuesday night in the first round for the NCAA Basketball Tournament. The Toreros were defeated 65-56 in their first-ever appearance in the Division I playoffs. page 1B 1

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MAR l 4 1984