CENTAUR SEASONS: ‘WE CAN TURN IT AROUND!’ — entry #13 from "A history of the events of the Allentown College’s 1972-1973 B-ball season …

… AS CHRONICLED BY, AND WITH THE PERSONAL MEMOIRS + OCCASSIONAL PHILOSOPHIZING OF THE AUTHOR, ONE STEPHEN J. McKEE”

This CENTAUR SEASONS post was written on January 18, 1973.

PREVIOUS GAME: Centaurs 82, Baptist Bible 84, two days ago

NEXT GAME: Wilmington College, tonight

CENTAUR SEASON: 2-4

Lots happened during the break. But only the most notable do I have time to mention now. Before Christmas I officially lost my starting position.

John Cooper, Dennis Ramella, Bobby Stormes, Bob Hoeffner and Joey Thompson are the starting five. I must, in order to start, beat out Coop. Gary Cacciatore — Dennis. P.J. Brennan – Joey. Chris Cashman – Stormesie. Dave Glielmi — Heff.

(“We Can Turn It Around!” continues below)

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WELCOME TO CENTAUR SEASONS. “We Can Turn It Around!” here on HoopsU.Com appears also on CENTAUR SEASONS, a “memory blog” of the half-good, half-bad, all-new Allentown College of St. Francis de Sales Centaurs in Center Valley, Pennsylvana. Forty years ago Steve kept a diary of his junior-year season. A blog before its time then, “A History of the Events …” is now an e-diary at CENTAUR SEASONS and here on HoopsU.com.

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Last night, we lost to Baptist Bible, 84-82. WE WERE UP NINE AT HALFTIME. They out-gutted us down the stretch. Coach said it, and he was right.

We had a team meeting after the game. Everybody seemed to be really down.

Tommy Shirley surprised everybody – well, at least me – by talking. He said that he felt that Coach’s idea of having one man sub for one man was not going to work. He felt that, and told Coach, “You need different people for different situations. Which could mean Steve and Coop in at the same time, or P.J. and Joey at the same time.”

He also said that because Jerry Fleming is such a good passer and he knows how to control a game, that “Flem should have played last night, against Baptist Bible, and if he had, we would have won the game.”

Tonight, against Wilmington, Coop, Dave, P.J., Dennis and Stormesie are starting. Obviously I have not yet beat out Coop. He is still putting the ball in the basket better than I am. But I am quite sure I am going to see a good deal of action tonight, Wilmington is BIG, and they can jump.

And yesterday after practice I talked to Coach about my present situation. He said the only way he can see us winning consistently is if I get more playing time. I liked to hear that.

WE WIN TONIGHT WE CAN TURN THE SEASON AROUND. I know we can.

PREVIOUS GAME: Centaurs 82, Baptist Bible 84, two days ago

NEXT GAME: Wilmihgton College, tonight

1972-73 CENTAUR SEASON Schedule and Results:

12/1 — at Lehigh CCC — W/81-71 — 1-0

12-4 — at Northampton CCC — W/87-50 — 2-0

12-6 — EASTERN BAPTIST — L/73-75 — 2-1

12-12 — SPRING GARDEN — L/54-66 — 2-2

12-16 — PHILLY BIBLE — L/72-79 — 2-3

1-18 — at Baptist Bible — L/82-84 — 2-4

1-19 — WILMINGTON

1-25 — at Philly Pharmacy

1-30 — at Spring Garden

2-3 — at Messiah College

2-6 — at Wilmington

2-13 — RUTGERS, S. JERSEY

2-16 — LEHIGH CCC

2-20 — MESSIAH

2-22 — NORTHAMPTON CCC

2-24 — PHILLY PHARMACY

2-27 — BAPTIST BIBLE

About
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Steve McKee

Steve McKee is the author of CENTAUR SEASONS, a memory blog about his basketball-playing days at Allentown (Pa.) College of St. Francis de Sales in the early 1970s (a good excuse for using his college yearbook picture -- though there's NO excuse for that mustache and hair!).

CENTAUR SEASONS can also be found at www.centaurseasons.com. The centerpiece will be the posting in "real time" of the diary that Steve kept of his 1972-1973 junior-year season, beginning on November 30. Prior to that (and after), Steve will be posting regularly about his freshman, sophomore and senior seasons, as well as about what it was like to be there at the beginning to help get a struggling college basketball program off the ground.

Steve was the original writer of The Wall Street Journal's popular sports blog, "The Daily Fix" in 2001-2002, and was even dubbed "The Unwitting Father of the Sports Blog" by Gelf Magazine, the online publication of the "Varsity Letters Reading Series. Steve was the Journal's sports editor for its original Weekend sport section and was involved in all of the Journal's Olympics coverage, Winter and Summer, from 1996 through 2008.

He is the author of three books, most recently "My Father's Heart: A Son's Reckoning With the Legacy of Heart Disease," which he is adapting as a one-man show. For his first book, "The Call of the Game," Steve traveled the country in search of sports events -- including the famous N.C. State Wolfpack victory over "Phi Slamma Jamma" of the University of Houston. For his second book, COACH, among the 150+ coaches Steve interviewed are/were college basketball coaches John Wooden (UCLA), Pat Summitt (Tennessee), Frank Layden (Niagara), Bobby Cremins (Georgia Tech), P.J. Carlesimo (Seton Hall), Bill Guthridge (North Carolina), Abe Lemons (Texas), Stan Morrison (USC), Kathy Rush (Immaculata), Jim Satalin (Duquesne), Charlie Thomas (San Francisco State), Butch Van Bredda Koff (Princeton), Bill Whitmore (Vermont) and LaDonna Wilson (Austin Peay).

For more, you can click on www.steve-mckee.com, where you can find a TODAY show appearance and an NPR interview.