Dave Bliss

Bob Knight said Monday he would remain at Indiana University because, after 23 years as a college basketball coach, he wasn't convinced he could approach a new job with the necessary energy or enthusiasm. Knight turned down the vacant coaching job at the University of New Mexico, he said, even though said he was attracted to its basketball program and to that area of the country.

Jim Boeheim has learned to take victories any way he can get them in 22 seasons at Syracuse. "When you don't shoot well, it looks like an ugly game," he said Sunday after his Orangemen beat New Mexico, 56-46, in the second round of the NCAA tournament's South Regional at Rupp Arena. "But it doesn't matter how you get there," he added. "We've played a lot of beautiful games and gone home." There would be the round of 16, in which fifth-seeded Syracuse (26-8) will play top-seeded Duke at St.

Former Laker Michael Cooper wants to become New Mexico's next basketball coach. Cooper, a member of five NBA championship teams with the Lakers after starring at New Mexico, dropped off a resume at the school Wednesday and said he will aggressively pursue the vacancy left by Dave Bliss, who resigned Tuesday to coach at Baylor. "I'm really after this, I want them to know," said Cooper, who was in Albuquerque visiting his three children. "I would be a good candidate, if not the solution.

The best quarterback of all time? Terry Bradshaw has four Super Bowl rings, so he would rate consideration, except he defers to the man who carved up his old team, the Pittsburgh Steelers, at the Orange Bowl Sunday. "Dan Marino is the best," said Bradshaw after Miami defeated Pittsburgh, 45-28. "And I'm not only talking about what he did today. I honestly thought Pittsburgh was going to win. But with Marino out there, they never had much of a chance. He's the best quarterback I ever saw."

Stacey King's 24 points and Mookie Blaylock's steal in the final seconds enabled No. 6-ranked Oklahoma to survive a scare by New Mexico and emerge with a 100-96 victory Thursday night at Albuquerque, N.M. The win, which was not certain until Blaylock hit a free throw after the steal with 5 seconds left, raised the Sooners' record to 4-1. New Mexico, off to its worst start since the scandal-marred 1979-80 season, is 2-4 under first-year Coach Dave Bliss, who succeeded Gary Colson.

Santa Clara, under first-year Coach Dick Davey, is in the NCAA basketball tournament for only the second time in 23 years. Davey, previously an assistant at Santa Clara for 15 years, told C.W. Nevius of the San Francisco Chronicle: "We probably have the second-toughest admission standards in the western United States (after Stanford). We don't cheat. We can't get anybody in school. "I remember six or seven years ago, we went to UCLA and they had something like 11 high school All-Americans.

Dave Bliss, a former assistant basketball coach to Bob Knight at West Point, told this story on the "General" to Randy Galloway of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. It was in the late 1960s, and Knight's West Point gang of young assistant coaches from all the sports at Army had just finished a game of very rough pickup basketball. On leaving the gym on this particular day, the weary group noticed a young female jogger huffing and puffing her way up a hill. "Look at her," Knight said.

USC's hunt for a basketball coach got closer to home Tuesday night when Athletic Director Mike McGee reportedly met with Pepperdine Coach Jim Harrick. Harrick, whose Waves were recently knocked out of the NCAA West Regional tournament in Long Beach by Maryland, most likely would accept the job if it was offered to him. Those close to him say that he has taken Pepperdine about as far as the school can go.

Baylor Coach Scott Drew may not have too many friends among his Big 12 coaching brethren. But on Friday, Drew and his Baylor team did what few teams have been able to do all season — quiet St. Mary's center Omar Samhan. With its 72-49 victory over St. Mary's in the Midwest Regional of the NCAA tournament, a Baylor program that was left in ruins following scandal and tragedy in 2003 is now on the cusp of earning its first Final Four berth since 1950. "I'm not thinking about the Final Four.

When New Mexico point guard Greg Brown heard he had won the Frances Pomeroy Naismith Award, friends and relatives were thrilled. Now he's waiting to see what pro coaches and scouts think. Lobos coach Dave Bliss said capturing the Naismith, which honors the outstanding men's college basketball senior under 6-feet and women's player under 5-foot-6, strengthens Brown's hopes for a pro basketball career.