For Woolridge, This Is Easy Street

Orlando Vernada Woolridge grew up on his parents’ farm near Mansfield, La., where he learned a couple of things early.

First, he learned he loathed farm work, particularly anything having to do with animals.

And second, he learned not to worry about Pop.

“My dad is a veterinarian and he also raises cattle, grows vegetables and teaches school, with my mom,” said Woolridge, the former assistant and new coach of the Sparks.

“One day when I was in high school, a freezing winter evening, I came home to help him load onto trucks the vegetables he’d picked all day.

“I looked at him and I saw his mustache was frozen, with ice on it, and I started to cry. I said to him, ‘Dad, I promise you this: I’m going to be a professional basketball player and when I do, you won’t have to do this anymore.’

“He looked at me and said, ‘Son, if you become a professional basketball player, that’d be great. But remember this: Whatever you do, I’ll be doing this the rest of my life.

“It’s who I am. It’s what I do.”

THE QUIET MAN

Woolridge isn’t a sideline wild man, as some expected.

He’s a guy you could plug a cord into and power up the Forum scoreboard.

He can talk basketball with you all day and then go all night, if you’re still awake.

So it wasn’t difficult to imagine his coaching demeanor: Pacing up and down the sideline . . . raging and cheering . . . working the officials . . . a show unto himself.

Turns out he rarely leaves his seat. When he does stand, he promptly goes to one knee, leaning on the scorer’s table.

He’s Mr. Contemplation, thinking chemistry.

“In a game, I’m thinking primarily of having players in areas of the court where they’re most comfortable and with teammates with whom they feel most comfortable,” he said.

“As an assistant, I could only suggest things. Now, it feels so good as a head coach to feel a game’s certain rhythm and to be able to actually do it. . . . Hey, it feels like a dunk.”

WELL-TRAVELED

Woolridge, 38, played for seven NBA teams, from 1981--when he was the Chicago Bulls’ first-round draft choice--to 1994. He was a Laker for the 1988-89 and 1989-90 seasons.

When he signed on early last summer as game scout for the Sparks, he had just finished his 15th pro season, the last three in Italy. After Linda Sharp was fired early last season, he was named a Spark assistant coach.

AND MR. HUMBLE

Frank Layden, 66, the new coach of the Utah Starzz and former coach of the Utah Jazz, was talking about his transition from the men’s to the women’s game the other day. Women are smarter, he said.

“It’s a humbling experience, after 33 years of coaching, to walk into a locker room and know you’re the dumbest person in the room,” he said.

And the toughest part of the transition?

“Remembering to knock before entering the locker room.”

CLASS ACT

It wasn’t really important, had no impact on her final game as the Sparks’ coach, but it was a little moment that says a lot about Julie Rousseau.

At Washington’s MCI Center last Wednesday, before a game Rousseau knew might be her last, a woman sang an extraordinary rendition of the national anthem.

As she walked off the court, Rousseau, a minute or two away from the opening tip, approached her and said, “Good job,” and shook her hand.

BUZZER-BEATERS

WNBA President Val Ackerman, on the league’s attendance average going over 10,000 in its second season: “Remember, it took the NBA 29 years to average 10,000.” . . . The ABL’s Philadelphia Rage, without a general manager since Cathy Andruzzi abruptly resigned in March, now has Jonathan Matthews, a former shoe company marketing executive, on board. . . . The ABL’s Chicago expansion team has its nickname, the Condors.