Ex-Rebel Green has Fla. Atlantic dancing

Steve Addy

Monday, March 4, 2002 | 9:11 a.m.

Former Rebels star Sidney Green is going back to the NCAA tournament with an unlikely school but in a most amazing way.

Having played in the NCAA tournament with UNLV as an All-American in 1983, Green coached Florida Atlantic to the Atlantic Sun Conference title Saturday in Orlando, nipping top-seeded Georgia State 76-75 to gain the automatic NCAA bid.

The victory capped a staggering turnaround in Green's third season at the school, a 23,000-student university in Boca Raton, Fla. The Owls were 2-28 in 1999-00, including a 21-point loss at UNLV, and 7-24 last season. They hadn't had a winning season since 1996-97.

But this season, its ninth in Division I, Florida Atlantic is 19-11 and earned the distinction of being the first team into the 65-team NCAA field. The Owls gained their bid hours before conference titles were decided in the Ohio Valley (Murray State) and Big South (Winthrop).

Third-seeded FAU went to the buzzer to beat Georgia State, the regular-season champions coached by Lefty Driesell. The Owls took the lead with six seconds left on a free throw by forward Robert Williams. Georgia State missed an off-balance 15-foot shot as time expired.

For Green, UNLV's all-time rebound leader and No. 2 scorer, the achievement fulfilled his ambitious expectations. Last week he was named the league's coach of the year.

"We accomplished something no one thought we could accomplish in such a short time," he told the Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel.

Green, who played at UNLV from 1979-83 and in the NBA for 11 seasons, has a 77-123 record in three coaching stints. He went 29-27 in two seasons at Long Island-Southampton (1995-97) and 20-33 in two seasons at North Florida (1997-99). He took the FAU job in March 1999.

Another former UNLV star, Mark Wade, joined the Owls this season as an assistant coach. He was the Rebels' director of basketball operations last year, but wasn't retained.