Frohlich, Jinks glad for chance to check out MJ’s old court

Steve Guiremand

Tuesday, March 12, 2002 | 10:07 a.m.

UNLV Lady Rebel basketball stars Linda Frohlich and Constance Jinks would have been happy to go anywhere in the country to play in their first NCAA Tournament. But both admit playing Saturday's first round game against Minnesota will be even more special for them because of the site of the contest.

Frohlich and Jinks, like many basketball youngsters of the '90s, grew up idolizing Michael Jordan. Now the duo gets a chance to practice and play on Jordan's old college home court, Carmichael Auditorium, on the University of North Carolina campus. The Tar Heels moved into the glossy Dean Smith Center, a k a The Dean Dome, in 1986, two years after Jordan left Chapel Hill.

"Ever since I started playing he was the one player who caught my eye," said Jinks, a Chicago native who wears Jordan's trademark No. 23 jersey for the Lady Rebels. "He's really the only player I can sit and watch play a whole game. I watch his body language, his moves, his attitude toward the game. Playing on his old court does make it more exciting. It will be exciting to see the place where his college career took off."

"I've always wanted to go there," Frohlich said. "I've seen pictures and films of all the big shots he made there. I absolutely can't wait to get there and see the place."

Frohlich said it was while watching Jordan and the Dream Team play in the 1992 Olympics that she got the urge to start concentrating on playing basketball back in her hometown of Oldendorf, Germany.

"That's when it really started for me," the three-time Mountain West Conference player of the year said. "The Dream Team was just awesome to watch play. They were my favorites."

So much so that Frohlich covered the walls in her room with posters of Jordan ("I think I have about 50 of him"), Scottie Pippen and even Dennis Rodman.

"If you were to ask my mother, she'd tell you my whole room was full of basketball posters," Frohlich said. "All the other girls in town had posters of (Beverly Hills) 90210 and stuff like that. But I had basketball posters, instead. They probably thought I was a little strange."

Miller, who starred for two NCAA Final Four teams at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Va., is from Fayetteville, N.C., about 50 miles south of Chapel Hill.

"It's ironic that we would go there," Miller said.

Sophomore forward Padra Strong also hails from Fayetteville where she starred at Pine Forest High School and played for the North Carolina Junior Olympic team. And Jan Bethea, the director of basketball operations for the Lady Rebels, is a native of nearby Raleigh who attended St. Augustine's College in that city.

So look for the Lady Rebels to have their fair share of fans at Carmichael Auditorium on Saturday.

Davis, who said she doesn't know any of the current Golden Gopher players, was recruited by Minnesota after earning second team all-state honors at Blake High School but decided to sign with Western Illinois and then head coach Regina Miller instead. She transferred to UNLV in the fall of 1998 after Miller took the Lady Rebels' head coaching job.

"It's ironic that we are playing Minnesota," Davis said. "My mom has been telling me about them all year and how they're having such a great year. Now we get to play them."