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Gottfried goes back Coach takes team to UCLA in game that honors mentor 12/06/01 STEVE IRVINE News staff writer TUSCALOOSA He was newly married, more than 2,000 miles away from home and paying $650 per month for an efficiency apartment. His monthly stipend at UCLA was $362 per month, his transportation was public and the only person he knew upon arrival in Los Angeles other than his wife was the man who had just hired him to be a graduate assistant for the Bruins. Those were good times for Alabama head men's basketball coach Mark Gottfried. "My wife (Elizabeth) and I had a great experience in California," said Gottfried, a Mobile native and Alabama graduate, who spent seven seasons as an assistant coach under Jim Harrick with the first coming in 1988-89. Gottfried left UCLA to become the head coach at Murray State following the Bruins NCAA championship season of 1994-95 and took over at Alabama in 1998. His first time to return to Southern California as Alabama's head coach is Saturday when Gottfried takes the No.16-ranked Crimson Tide to the Anaheim Pond for a p.m. matchup against 20th-ranked UCLA in the Wooden Classic. "It's special, first off because it's the Wooden Classic," Gottfried said of the event honoring his mentor John Wooden. "You know I was fortunate enough to build a good relationship with Coach Wooden when I was at UCLA. Just to play in that event is going to be fun for me." Gottfried befriended Wooden soon after joining the UCLA coaching staff. Learning the craft from a man who won 885 games overall and 10 NCAA national championships seemed like a good idea. "I can remember Coach Harrick told us we were going to go eat breakfast with Coach Wooden one morning," Gottfried said of his first meeting with Wooden. "I sat there, watched him eat his pancakes and have syrup on his chin like all the rest of us. I thought `That's John Wooden over there eating pancakes.'" Over the next seven years Gottfried spent as much time as he could with Wooden absorbing wisdom about everything from basketball handling youngsters to life's lessons. "Every time I went to his house I wanted to tape record in my mind what he would say," said Gottfried, who still chats with Wooden regularly. What developed from the visits was Gottfried adopting Wooden's philosophies as a coach. Watch Alabama practice today and you'll see some of the same practice plans used by Wooden. "He preaches John Wooden this and John Wooden that," said Alabama guard Terrance Meade. Gottfried admits that he quotes Wooden so much that often when he begins a statement, the players finish it before he can. But those same players don't really know the full legacy of Wooden. When asked about his knowledge of UCLA's storied past, Alabama center Erwin Dudley mentioned Ed O'Bannon and the 1994-95 NCAA championship team. That was 20 seasons after Wooden retired. "Adults couldn't understand why a young player didn't want to go to UCLA," Gottfried said. "Kids that we recruited (at UCLA) from say age 10 when they started paying attention to basketball to age 17 didn't watch John Wooden. It's very similar to a football player in our state who hasn't watched Bear Bryant." Gottfried has asked Wooden to speak with the Crimson Tide at the team's hotel either today or Friday. On Saturday, Gottfried will coach against UCLA. But if Gottfried hadn't taken the Murray State job in 1995, he might instead be the head coach at UCLA. Harrick was fired by UCLA athletics director Pete Dalis just 14 days before the 1996 season began. Because the season was set to begin, Steve Lavin, who just two years prior was the No.3 assistant behind Gottfried and Lorenzo Romar, was chosen as the interim coach. Six seasons later Lavin is still the head coach. What if? "I get asked that question a lot," Gottfried said. "I think in life you gotta go with what happened. I think being at Murray State was a great thing for me as a coach. To be at a place, quite honestly, where the country really wasn't watching and evaluating helped prepare me for this job tremendously. I really feel like the way things have worked out, I'm where I'm supposed to be here at Alabama." ________________________________________________________________ GET INTERNET ACCESS FROM JUNO! Juno offers FREE or PREMIUM Internet access for less! Join Juno today! For your FREE software, visit: http://dl.www.juno.com/get/web/. To unsubscribe from this list just send an e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a BLANK subject line and the single word "UNSUBSCRIBE" (without the quotes) in the body or visit http://www.RollTideFan.net
