COLLEGE BASKETBALL
Flames losing on, off the court
Illinois-Chicago tries to recover from season filled with turmoil
By Lew Freedman
Tribune staff reporter
Published January 29, 2007
When Illinois-Chicago center Scott VanderMeer walks around campus, students stop him to ask about the basketball team. Not about its record, but about its missing coaches and players.
"People ask, `What's going on?'" VanderMeer said.
He has no answer for them and not much of an answer for himself. In just longer than a month, more bad things have happened to Flames coaches and players than most schools face in a decade.
"It's crazy," VanderMeer said.
The last time 10-year head coach Jimmy Collins sat on the bench for the Flames was a Dec. 21 game at Penn. The next day Collins asked the school for an open-ended leave of absence for physical and mental exhaustion. On Jan. 5 Collins underwent surgery to repair an abdominal aortic aneurysm and he still is sidelined.
On Jan. 18 UIC player Luis Martinez filed a federal lawsuit alleging assistant coach Lynn Mitchem had harassed him sexually. Mitchem has not coached since Dec. 23 and Martinez, who appeared in just three games as a walk-on, left the team.
Associate head coach Mark Coomes took over and urged the players to pull together as a unit.
"One thing I stress is our inner circle," Coomes said. "We want to support ourselves."
Soon after, however, junior forward Kevin Bond and senior guard D.J. Smedley quit the team. Senior guard Greg Zimny also left the squad. And junior guard Karl White was ruled academically ineligible.
"It's a different inner circle now," Coomes said. "It's not easy. I have to stay strong myself."
Forward Othyus Jeffers, the Flames' top scorer, said Coomes talked with the players, urged them to stay focused and continue to make something special out of their Horizon League season. UIC won three of their next four games, including an upset of No. 14 Butler--the team the Flames face Monday night in Indianapolis--and intracity rival Loyola.
But then the roster disintegrated further and now the Flames have a four-game losing streak.
"All of a sudden the circle got more broken up," Jeffers said. "I'm shaking my head, but there's nothing you can do about it. That's life. There are going to be struggles."
Jeffers said "everybody misses" Collins, but he doubts the players ever will know everything that went on.
"We talk as a team, and everybody copes with it in their own way," Jeffers said. "I have to play the same. I give everybody the same love [whether it is Collins or Mitchem]."
Mitchem is on administrative leave from the university and sports information director Mike Cassidy said no one connected to the team is allowed to answer specific questions about the assistant coach's situation.
"It's university policy that we cannot discuss litigation," Cassidy said. Senior forward Jovan Stefanov, who is from Serbia, hopes to play professional basketball in Europe next season. He said the turmoil has been disruptive and might diminish opportunities for him.
"It's really hard," he said. "I never thought about basketball so much in my entire life. The only thing keeping us playing is our love for the game.
"Everything keeps happening. Every play you make, you don't just think about that shot, you think about so much more. It's definitely distracting. It's definitely a life-changing experience. It just makes you stronger."
Fresh-breaking bad fortune conspired to leave the Flames with just seven able-bodied players in Saturday's 60-55 home loss to Cleveland State that dropped their overall record to 9-13.
Spencer Stewart, who injured his left leg against Detroit on Jan. 20, missed a second game; Bobby Rush injured his left hand against Wisconsin-Green Bay on Wednesday and couldn't play; Coomes suspended forward Danijel Zoric indefinitely for hitting a Green Bay player; guard Josh Mayo's aunt died Thursday and he missed Saturday's game for the funeral.
"All in 30 days," Cassidy said of the occurrences that sliced the coaching staff and reduced the number of players against Cleveland State from 16 listed in the media guide. "It has been a unique experience."
VanderMeer, a sophomore from Dyer, Ind., who is one of the country's top shot-blockers, said the only time he doesn't dwell on the Flames' situation is during games.
"I don't think any other team in the country is going through what we are," he said.
Before playing in a game where UIC had about the same number of available players as did Hickory High in "Hoosiers," Jeffers summed up the tribulations.
"This year could be a movie," he said.
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