Coach turned Gophers into tourney team

Steve Guiremand

Wednesday, March 13, 2002 | 10:31 a.m.

Expectations weren't very high when 31-year-old Brenda Oldfield left Ball State to become the women's head basketball coach at the University of Minnesota last spring -- and for good reason.

The Golden Gophers were coming off a dismal 1-15 Big Ten campaign and had amassed a dreadful 7-57 mark in conference play the prevous four years. Minnesota hadn't won more than three Big Ten games in any season during that span.

Toss in the fact that the NCAA was investigating the program for a variety of infractions, including allegations that former head coach Cheryl Littlejohn had paid a former player, and there wasn't reason for a lot of optimism going into the 2001-2002 season.

But Oldfield said that all changed after a couple of weeks of practice last fall.

"When you inherit a rebuilding program you think it will probably take three or four years to get things turned around," Oldfield said. "But once we had one or two weeks of practice, I could see there was a lot of hidden talent here."

It's not hidden anymore.

Minnesota (21-7), which faces UNLV (23-7) in the first round of the NCAA Midwest Regional on Saturday afternoon in Chapel Hill, N.C., may be the comeback story of the year in college basketball.

The Golden Gophers recorded the biggest turnaround in Big Ten history, improving from 1-15 in 2000-01 to 11-5 and a second-place finish this year. Minnesota also swept the conference's three major postseason awards with Oldfield claiming Big Ten Coach of the Year honors while sophomore point guard Lindsay Whalen (22.8 ppg, 6.06 apg) was named the conference Player of the Year and 6-foot-2 center Janel McCarville (15.1 ppg, 8.2 rpg in Big Ten play) claimed Freshman of the Year honors.

Not bad for a team that got booted out of its home arena in January when a pipe broke and flooded its floor. Or has to practice in the morning so that guard Corrin Von Wold, an architecture major, can make her afternoon studio lab three times a week.

"Obviously this team has been through a lot of adversity," said Oldfield, who knows a thing or two about adversity.

As a guard at the University of Arizona from 1988 to 1993, she underwent four surgeries for bone spurs in the heels of her feet.

"She would hardly practice for us because we needed her for the games," said current UNLV assistant coach Pat Charity, who helped recruit Oldfield from Cedar Rapids, Iowa to Tucson. "It was extremely painful for her to play. She'd take cortisone shots just so she could get out there."

Oldfield credits Charity with helping her through those tough times.

"She had a major impact on my career," she said. "She was an assistant coach a lot of players could go to with their problems."

"I tried to stay around her and keep her positive through all the tough moments," Charity said. "She came and worked some basketball camps I had at Western Michigan. We developed a good friendship. My husband and I pretty much adopted her."

Charity said she was not surprised to see her former player become a successful head coach.

"Most definitely I thought she'd be a good coach," Charity said. "It's because of her personality and the fact she's a great communicator and a hard worker. She's done a great job at Minnesota."

One of Oldfield's best moves was switching from a plodding, halfcourt-style offense to an up-tempo brand of basketball that exploited the skills of the 5-8 Whalen.

"She's just a tremendous player," Oldfield said of the finalist for the Nancy Lieberman Step Up Award, which recognizes the nation's top point guard. "She's one of the most competitive players I've ever coached. She does whatever she needs to do to be successful. She has an extremely quick first step."

The Twin Cities have taken to the Golden Gophers, who rewrote a number of school attendance records, including a turnout of 12,142 at famed Williams Arena for a Feb. 24 game against Michigan State.

"The pipe breaking turned out to be a blessing in disguise for us," Oldfield said. "It broke open the door for us to get into Williams Arena which I think a lot of fans liked. We averaged 8,800 fans after the pipe broke. Hopefully that will allow us to continue playing in there."

Here's the scary part for Big Ten coaches: The best may be yet to come from the Gophers. No seniors start and Whalen still has two more years of eligibility left.

"The players have responded well to all the adversity they have gone through," Oldfield said. "We just need to continue to work hard and improve."