Columnist Dean Juipe: Spoonhour blameless in this mess

Dean Juipe

Friday, Aug. 10, 2001 | 10:30 a.m.

Dean Juipe's column appears Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. His boxing notebook appears Thursday. Reach him at juipe@lasvegassun.com or 259-4084.

Charlie Spoonhour doesn't deserve this.

Hired March 29 to coach the UNLV men's basketball team, he may have sensed the school had its share of internal turmoil yet he couldn't possibly have anticipated being named on a late-summer list of complaints filed against university president Carol Harter.

But there was his name in a Sun story this week, cited as the origin of sorts of all of Harter's problems. "If you track (this) back, I think you'll find that it all links back to the selection of the basketball coach," said Jeff Burr, the chairman of UNLV's planned-giving committee.

What?

Harter was under the gun in some quarters long before Spoonhour arrived on campus. There had been both public and private sniping directed her way for some time.

Now, of course, she's immersed in assorted conflicts and there are those in the community who would like to see her ousted.

Regardless of how Harter's situation plays out, Spoonhour has done nothing to merit a mention in the fray. It seems erroneous to even include him in the mix.

He was the best available coach when he was hired and he's a friendly man with a wealth of big-time experience. He was a good choice in March and, from all reports, has worked diligently since taking over the Rebels.

He remains a good choice to lead a program that badly needed some direction.

Are people still mad that Rick Pitino didn't come here? If so, they need to get over it.

Pitino, as was evident at the time, was playing UNLV and using the school as leverage for a huge contract that he eventually accepted from Louisville. Not only did Spoonhour play no role in Pitino's decision, it could be argued that Harter didn't either.

Pitino isn't a West Coast guy and he had no intention of relocating to Las Vegas.

And for those boosters who feel interim coach Max Good got a raw deal and deserved greater consideration for the permanent job, you're just plain wrong.

Aside from filling in after Bill Bayno was fired, Good's contributions at UNLV were minimal. He was hired as an assistant by Bayno in 1999 because it was believed he could deliver a couple of top recruits, yet he failed to produce the goods. And after replacing Bayno as head coach, Good's team all but quit and played out the 2001 portion of its schedule in a very lackluster fashion.

You want to know how highly Max Good is regarded as a coach? Look at the basketball stature of the school that recently hired him: Bryant College, in Smithville, R.I.

Bryant is neither a basketball hotbed nor a place where great basketball coaches choose to go. It's a place for a mediocre coach who can't even get an assistant's job at a major university.

It's well and good for the people who liked him at UNLV to be appreciative of his efforts, yet Good was not going to provide the Rebels with a long-term solution to their problems. If anything, credit Harter for recognizing the obvious and looking elsewhere for a new coach.

Those still brooding about it need to step back and reassess their position. Whether Harter stays or goes, Spoonhour needs the public's unequivocal support.

Without it, failure is inevitable.