Likable Ethnicites

With the risk of upsetting some Looie fans, we'd have to say that it was a mistake to admit St. John's basketball coach Lou Carnessecca into the basketball hall of fame last week. The induction typifies the overrated nature of the Big East (as much as we love St. John's) and its coaches.

College basketball in the East is tremendously overrated and overexposed. While great players come out of all areas in the West, everyone seems to think no ball player is any good unless he comes out of the New York or Philadelphia ghettoes. The only other semi-acknowledged (by these Eastern hoops gurus) source of basketball talent is the fields of Indiana, the land of the Hoosier myth. But only rarely does a great one emerge from the wheat fields and the single hoop planted in the grass by a dirt road.

The Big East, however, has not managed to disguise the truth of the situation. A Big East team hasn't won the NCAA's since the year Villanova upset Georgetown in the finals. Since then, it's been all ACC and Big Ten. There can be no denying the profusion of young basketball talent thriving in the small and large towns of the Midwest and the South. And yet, Carnessecca still gets voted into the Hall of Fame and a severely mediocre Villanova squad plays on national television several times throughout the season.

Let us, then, take a brief look at Carnessecca's reign at St. John's Despite sitting smack in the middle of a basketball hotland, Looie has never won it all. In fact, he's only reached the Final Four once, while every other year, his St. John's team slips into the tournament and gets knocked out by the third round. His central weakness is his inability to accept the fact that great basketball talent lies outside the concrete jungles of New York City. His team is invariably composed of Big Apple-bred players, a fact which limits the depth and talent of his squad.

Looies' had a generally successful career, but a lively, bouncy, likeable ethnicity does not warrant a plaque in the Hall of Fame. If it were, Carnessecca's plaque would hang next to that of the Prego lady.