Long Beach Fouls Up at Free-Throw Line

Both backboards at the Boise State University Pavilion are being treated for second-degree contusions today after weathering--barely--a brutal assault by the Long Beach State free-throw shooters Friday afternoon.

No, free-throw shooters is too haughty a description for this collection of fling-and-a-prayer castaways. Kind of like calling a garbage man “a sanitation engineer” or a replacement baseball player “a professional athlete.”

Foul shooters --that’s more to the point.

Foul as in off line, foul as in less than fair, foul as in hold your nose and run for the nearest exit.

Twenty-six times in their first-round round NCAA playoff game against Utah, the 49ers toed the treacherous foul stripe, with all the enthusiasm of a condemned man approaching the plank.

Fourteen times the ball made a dull, sickening sound as it glanced off plexiglass and painted metal at angles seldom seen in standard geometry textbooks.

Friday, the 49ers didn’t just miss their foul shots. They nearly missed Idaho. Drop-kicking the ball through the hoop would have been a better option. Or Fed-Exing it. Left to their own devices, the 49ers became the 46ers. Twelve of 26--46%.

Wilt Chamberlain did it better.

Donkey basketball players do it better.

Because the 49ers failed to do it any better, they ended their season here with a thud, losing by 12 points after missing 14 free throws.

Draw your own correlation, please.

“Free throws have been a problem for this team all year,” Long Beach forward Terrance O’Kelley said sadly, slumped in front of his locker.

“It finally caught up with us today. Unfortunately.”

Long Beach was something of a rarity this college basketball season--a 20-victory team that got by without doing the little things. The 49ers placed second in the Big West Conference and won the Big West tournament while placing 10th, or last, in the conference in foul shooting.

For the season, the 49ers shot 63.4%. Two starters, forward Juaquin Hawkins (52.4%) and center Joe McNaull (57.8%), shot less than 60%. Senior forward Mike Atkinson was the only 49er to shoot better than 70%, which may be the reason why his playing minutes dwindled down the stretch.

Asked if this was the worst free-throw performance he had ever been a part of, Long Beach Coach Seth Greenberg smiled thinly and said, “You coach at Long Beach State long enough, you’re going to coach some bad free throw-shooting teams.”

It’s part of the scenery at Long Beach State. Just another brick in the Pyramid, so to speak.

“It’s definitely a problem,” O’Kelley allowed, but one that’s correctable, right? Practice makes perfect, results through repetition, all that?

O’Kelley shook his head no.

“We never shoot free throws in practice,” O’Kelley said.

Come again?

“We don’t shoot free throws in practice,” McNaull corroborated. His face flushed red as he started to laugh, as if he was embarrassed by the admission.

“We talk about that a lot as players,” McNaull said. “Why don’t we practice them? Who knows?”

Well, how about the coach?

“I’m not big on having one guy shoot free throws and three guys standing around, clapping every time he makes one,” Greenberg said. “With the limited practice time you have, I think that’s counter-productive.

“We don’t practice free throws, but we shoot the ball a lot. From the post and the perimeter. We must shoot 30 minutes a day. It doesn’t matter where you shoot from. If you have good rhythm and a good stroke, you’re going to make free throws.”

That’s one coach’s philosophy, any way.

After the fact, much too late to do the 49ers any good, O’Kelley wondered aloud if Greenberg should rethink his position.

“Maybe Coach needs to think about it in the future,” O’Kelley said. “The free throw is probably one of the easiest shots. All it takes is repetition.”

Lack of repetition cost the 49ers dearly in Boise. Long Beach trailed most of the game, by as many as 14 points, but a breakaway jam by Rasul Salahuddin cut the deficit to 61-55 and with 6:39 remaining, a Utah foul sent Hawkins to the free-throw line with a chance to slice it to four.

Hawkins, of course, missed both shots, Utah converted at the other end and any hope of a Long Beach comeback wilted there and then.

The 49ers are going home, finishing their season at 20-10, and Greenberg may or may not be headed with them. Accompanying Greenberg into the arena Friday were reports that he is a leading candidate for the coaching vacancy at Nevada Las Vegas, a vacancy Greenberg doesn’t deny having interest in.

Last month, Greenberg swept aside similar advances from USC. UNLV, however, “has a greater tradition than USC, has more of a recent history and has a better facility.” He insists that “I have not had any offer from UNLV. I just had two five-minute conversations with people there. That’s really been the extent of it.”

But two five-minute conversations can turn into a four-year contract, plus perks, very quickly in this business. At the minimum, Greenberg should be interviewed by UNLV officials in the coming week. Then, who knows?

If UNLV wants a basketball coach who coaches everything except free throws, Greenberg could very well be the man.