The tale of how Jerry West turned himself into the best player of his era and one of the greatest ever could have begun anywhere.
So sickly he was held out of games against the other kids, West spent hour after hour alone, no matter the season, dribbling a basketball on dirt and shooting at a hoop a neighbor had nailed to a storage shed. But his inspiration?
That was pure West Virginia.
``I can't say I had a favorite player growing up, anybody I really modeled myself after.'' West recalled during a telephone interview earlier this week. ``We were one of those families that didn't have the means to watch TV a whole lot and even then, because of where we lived, the broadcasts were always going in and out. I almost never got to hear more than a minute or two at a time.
``I don't know if that's the reason,'' he added. ``But right from the start, the program was always more important to me than the individual parts.''
That remains so a half-century later, even with all the great players, past and present, who have been part of West Virginia basketball.
West thinks it has something to do with the hardscrabble character of the state, about how people are knit together by learning to make do with less yet sharing much of what they have. It also might explain how the Mountaineers made it back to the Final Four for the first time since he led them there 51 years ago: No coach in the country is better at selling the ``us-against-the-world'' story line to his players than West Virginia native Bob Huggins.
``Resilient is the way I'd describe this team, which covers almost everything you hope for as a former player,'' West said.
``These guys cover for each other all over the floor, they look out for each other. That doesn't happen by accident. ... It's why I've got a lot of admiration for their coach. He gets lots of heat, but not enough credit. He's simply one of the four or five best coaches in America.''
West might be prejudiced, since his son, Jonnie, plays for Huggins. But considering West's track record as a player, coach and the savviest NBA executive of the last two decades, that appraisal might get one or two of the countless out-of-state critics off Huggins' back. And either way, it's no big deal. ``Huggy Bear'' couldn't be much more loved in West Virginia than he is at the moment.
The locals don't care why he got run off at Cincinnati or walked out on Kansas State after just one year. They like that Huggins runs bruising practices, yells a lot and sits on the bench in a sweat suit. They're even willing to overlook the abysmal graduation rates and the 6-year-old DUI.
All because he finally came home.
In fact, Huggins' workingman's approach is so popular that play-by-play of West Virginia tournament games was piped into offices across the state and even down into the coal mines. If the Mountaineers win it all, Huggins said he'll bring the trophy there, too, just so the miners can hold it.
West wouldn't bet against either thing happening.
``He's got them playing a wearying game and teams that run up and down the court won't be able to do it to them. And so over the course of a game, they usually find a way to impose their will. I've always been a firm believer in substance over style,'' West said, ``and I'm not the only one.''
The funny thing is when West chose the Mountaineers over five dozen other schools, flash was in at West Virginia. In 1955, sophomore guard Rod ``Hot Rod'' Hundley lifted the program to prominence and its first NCAA tournament appearance, then took the Mountaineers back twice more only to lose in the first round each time.
With Hundley's graduation in 1957, West Virginia became West's team. No one played more fundamentally sound on both ends of the court or was better in crunch time. The Mountaineers went 26-2 in West's sophomore season and collected their first-ever No. 1 ranking, then 29-6 when he was a junior and all the way to the national championship game.
West put up 28 points and grabbed 11 boards in that one - a typical night, considering he remains the school's scoring and rebounding leader, both single-season and career. But Cal beat West Virginia 71-70.
``Something I never forgot,'' West recalled glumly. ``It's one of the two more dubious distinctions I achieved: being named MVP of the losing team in the NCAA championship, then again with the Lakers, when we lost the NBA finals.''
West used those setbacks, like all the ones before and after, as fuel. He kept tabs on his team back home all the while, watching Rod Thorn pick up the mantle, then suffering though the lean years, then looking on with pride when Kevin Pittsnogle and Mike Gansey carried the Mountaineers to back-to-back Sweet 16 appearances in 2005-06. The past few days have stirred all those memories of West Virginia and more.
``I remember the day I made the decision to go there like it was yesterday. I was a shy, quiet kid and there were three college coaches sitting on the front porch when I got home. My mother came out and said to me, 'Don't listen to a word.' Then she looked at the three of them and said in a loud voice, 'I only want Jerry to go to West Virginia.'
``Loyalty means a lot to people back there. Truth is,'' West said chukcling, ``I never really entertained the idea of going anywhere else.''
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Jim Litke is a national sports columnist for The Associated Press. Write to him at jlitke(at)ap.org.
