When legends clash
Not too many fans know that Gilas head coach Chot Reyes went up against a basketball coaching legend when the Philippines took on Chinese Taipei White in the Jones Cup in Taipei last Monday.
The man Reyes opposed was Charlie Parker, now 68 and in the twilight of a storybook career that has spanned over 40 years. Parker was an assistant coach with the Dallas Mavericks from 1995 to 2005 and had the same position with the New Orleans Hornets, now Pelicans, in 2006-07. He was on fabled coach George Raveling’s staff at the University of Southern California (USC) for six years before moving in as the Trojans’ head coach. He was previously head coach at Wayne State which posted a 120-56 record during his six-year watch. In one season, Parker piloted Wayne State to a 24-7 mark and into the NCAA Division II quarterfinals. In every season, Wayne State had at least 20 wins with Parker at the helm.
Rounding out his collegiate resume, Parker was an assistant coach at Bowling Green where he earned a Master’s degree in education and at the University of Findlay in Ohio where he finished with a degree in health and physical education plus a minor in sociology.
When Raveling retired due to a nearfatal car accident in November 1994, Parker took over as USC head coach on an interim basis two days before the opening of the season. The Trojans got off to a 7-7 start but lost their last 14 games in an alarming tailspin. Still, USC signed up Parker as permanent head coach. He was upbeat before the start of the 1995-96 campaign. “There’s a mission by the players, the staff and the athletic department to put on the floor a product that people will be thrilled to want to see again,” he said. “We’re in the entertainment capital of America and we’ve got to put forth a product that the fans want to see. There were a lot of distractions the previous season. We tried to instill a new offensive and a new defensive philosophy and we tried to do it too fast. What we want to do is run, press, score quickly and be exciting. We’re going to throw ourselves out there defensively and make things happen.”
** * * Unfortunately, Parker didn’t last long on the bench. He didn’t even finish the season. Parker was fired in a “messy” situation after the Trojans stumbled to an 11-10 record, losing nine of their last 14 games. There were nine games left in the schedule. Parker’s termination was widely criticized in media and basketball circles. Arizona coach Lute Olson said the dismissal was “an embarrassment to USC and a horrible indictment of intercollegiate athletics … Charlie has done a really good job and his team was playing good, solid basketball … but more importantly, Charlie is a class guy … he and his wife, a tremendous young lady, both have distinguished themselves working in the inner city with kids … I can’t imagine two people representing USC better than those two.”
Parker went on to coach in Bahrain and Japan before he was tapped as head coach by the Chinese Taipei Basketball Federation. In between foreign assignments, Parker served as an assistant coach with the Texas Legends in the NBA D-League in 2014-15. Last year, Parker steered Chinese-Taipei to the final of the sixth Asian University Basketball Championships in Mongolia.
In the ongoing Jones Cup, Parker recruited 6-10 former University of Idaho center Kyle Barone to play for the national B team. Parker and Barone share the same agent Debora Zoli of Los Angeles. Since long-time Chinese-Taipei naturalized player Quincy Davis is on his last year with the national team, Barone may be a candidate to replace him. Barone, 27, played four years at Idaho, raising his scoring clip from 5.0 as a freshman to 10.5 as a sophomore to 12.8 as a junior to 17.1 as a senior. He has seen action in Italy, Hungary, Poland, Japan and Taiwan. Last season, he averaged 17.9 points and 10.6 rebounds with the Aomori Watts in the Japanese B League Division II.
Against Gilas, Chinese-Taipei White put up a tough fight before losing, 9382. The score was tied, 44-44 at the half. White shot 17-of-21 free throws to Gilas’ 10-of-17 but hit only 28-of-66 field goals to the Philippines’ 36-of-77. Chinese-Taipei had more rebounds, 40-37, but lost in the battle of possessions because of 22 turnovers. Gilas had only nine errors. Barone had 16 points, 12 rebounds, three assists and two blocked shots.