50 for 50 – Len Bias’ Golden Moments #28…Keith Gatlin struggles

Keith Gatlin struggles

Keith Gatlin, a junior point guard on the 1986 Maryland team, admits that he was in denial, struggling with the fact that his close friend had died from a drug he never saw or even heard of him using. He tried to escape by attending the graduation of a friend at Pepperdine University in California, but he quickly found that a change of venue even some 3,000 miles away did little good. “I get off the plane, and one of the first people I see says, ‘Hey, ain’t you Gatlin? Man, what happened to Lenny Bias?’ ” he said in the Post. “And I figured if I can’t go to Malibu Beach to escape this stuff, then my mother is right. I can’t run from it.” “I was getting ridiculed and I had nothing to do with it,” he says in 2010. “I’m thinking this is crazy. I was guilty by association. Because we played at Maryland, everybody perceived us as being a pot smoker and bad kids. I felt like everybody on the team was being targeted. I was very bitter. We were young men having a great time in college.”

After Maryland coach Driesell was removed and athletic director Dick Dull resigned, Gatlin felt he had lost any remaining support at the school. “You couldn’t turn to no one and not think they won’t stab you in the back,” he says. Admittedly distracted, Gatlin failed to register for classes in the fall semester and was ruled ineligible for the 1986-87 season. (Media reports claimed that Gatlin couldn’t register due to unpaid parking tickets, but he says the amount he owed would not have prevented him from signing up for classes.) Gatlin would likely have missed at least the early part of the season, regardless: He says he had knee surgery that summer to repair a damaged ligament. He admits that his thoughts were far from basketball and school. “I took the wrong approach,” he says. “I was young, I felt like ‘This is not fair.’ Instead of handling it like an adult, I went into a shell and had the ‘F the world’ mentality. That lasted the whole year for me.”

Excerpted from the book, Born Ready: the Mixed Legacy of Len Bias

Learn about the Born Ready Project that teaches life skills, using Len’s legacy as a teaching tool.

Find out about the Born Ready Hoops Festival  Nov. 22-24, that will honor Len’s legacy as a basketball player.

Dull Displaced

“I don’t have regrets.”

On the morning of June 19, 1986, Maryland Athletic Director Dick Dull was home when Maryland Assistant Vice President John Bielec called to inform him of Bias’s death. Dull immediately called Jeff Hathaway, an assistant athletic director, to go to Leland Memorial Hospital in nearby Riverdale and confirm the news. The tragedy turned Dull’s world upside down. “I was in shell shock for about six weeks,” he says. “You go from being the fair-haired boy to people calling for you to leave. It was difficult for me to handle. It was unlike anything I had ever seen.”

Dull says he felt as if he were one of the main characters in what he called “a Greek tragedy” in which there were no winners. “I can remember walking out of my office to go to the bathroom, and someone would be following me down the hallway. It was like that every day.”

When Dull publicly stated that head basketball coach Lefty Driesell should keep his job despite the fact that he was part of a grand jury investigation, he sensed his own job was in jeopardy. It was a move that helped convince Maryland Chancellor John Slaughter that a change was needed. “Dr. Slaughter told me ‘I wish you hadn’t said that.’ He felt he had to make a decision about Driesell,” Dull says. “I painted myself in a corner because of my support for Lefty. We agreed that the situation was not going to go away unless I stepped away. I don’t have regrets.”

Excerpted from the book, Born Ready: the Mixed Legacy of Len Bias

Learn about the Born Ready Project that teaches life skills, using Len’s legacy as a teaching tool.

Final Hours, Part 2

“We’re all [expletive] up.”

Shortly after 2:30 a.m. on June 19, Bias woke up David Gregg and told Gregg and Terry Long to get some beer from a nearby refrigerator. Long and Gregg saw a mound of cocaine on a mirror on the desk when they returned to Long’s room. After Gregg asked Bias and Brian Tribble where the cocaine came from, Long said, “Tribble said something about getting it from the bottom of a stash and they planned to get a kilo the next day.”

Long, Gregg, Bias and Tribble started snorting the cocaine through cut straws until about 3 a.m. when Jeff Baxter knocked on Long’s door. Long told Tribble to put the cocaine away when Baxter knocked because the players knew Baxter did not use drugs. Baxter stayed for about 15 minutes. The others then resumed snorting cocaine. Tribble went to the bathroom, stumbled back to Long’s room and said, “We’re all [expletive] up.” Long added that they all felt much the same way.

They snorted cocaine until sometime after 6 a.m. Bias then rested on Long’s bed for about five minutes before struggling to go to the bathroom because he was wobbly. Bias then suffered a seizure. Long placed a pair of scissors in Bias’s mouth to prevent him from biting his tongue while Gregg held Bias’s feet. Tribble called his mother who told him to call the county emergency number for an ambulance. Tribble made the emergency call at 6:32 a.m.

After the ambulance took Bias to the hospital, Long cleaned the empty beer bottles and cut straws from his room and emptied them into a dumpster behind the dormitory. Bias was pronounced dead at the hospital at 8:55 a.m. Cocaine intoxication was later determined to be the cause.

Excerpted from the book, Born Ready: the Mixed Legacy of Len Bias

Learn about the Born Ready Project that teaches life skills, using Len’s legacy as a teaching tool.

Final Hours, Part 1

“We’re Going to Celebrate”

Bias stayed in Boston the following day to meet with representatives of Reebok and the Boston media. The following description of how Bias’s last night evolved is based on testimony by Terry Long at the trial of Brian Tribble, according to reports, and from portions of the documentary Without Bias.

Bias returned to his dormitory suite at Washington Hall after 10:30 p.m. on June 18 with a bag full of Reebok shoes and Boston Celtic jerseys. David Gregg, a freshman basketball player, and Maryland football players Brian (Keeta) Covington and Ben Jefferson were there eating crabs. Bias wanted them to have a party, Long testified. “We’re going to celebrate,” Bias said to Gregg, Covington and Jefferson.

About 20 minutes later, Bias left the suite at about 11:30 p.m. with Madelyne Woods, a friend of Bias’s who stopped by to visit. Bias said he had to “go drain his lizard.”

“We knew what he meant,” Long said. “He said he hadn’t been with a girl in three days.” Long and Gregg walked to a nearby convenience store to buy soft drinks and went to sleep when they returned. At around 2:30 a.m., Bias, who was with Tribble, knocked on Long’s bedroom door and said “Wake the [expletive] up. We’re gonna celebrate.”

Excerpted from the book, Born Ready: the Mixed Legacy of Len Bias

Learn about the Born Ready Project that teaches life skills, using Len’s legacy as a teaching tool.

Senior Honors

Bias is 1st Team All-America, ACC POY Again

His team wasn’t playing, but Bias nonetheless suffered another setback during the ACC tournament final in 1986. When the winner of the John R. Wooden Award was announced at halftime, boos echoed through the Greensboro Coliseum. The award, honoring the top college player of the year in the nation, went to Walter Berry of St. John’s University. Bias had finished third in the voting, behind Berry and runner-up Johnny Dawkins of Duke. Three days later, however, Bias beat out Dawkins and the other top ACC players to be named ACC Player of the Year for the second consecutive season. He was also named first-team All-America along with Dawkins and became Maryland’s first consensus All-America since John Lucas in 1976.

Excerpted from the book, Born Ready: the Mixed Legacy of Len Bias

Learn about the Born Ready Project that teaches life skills, using Len’s legacy as a teaching tool.

Terps Top Scorer

Bias Achieves Another Milestone

After its rocky start in 1986, Maryland won six of its last 8 regular season games to gather momentum for an NCAA tournament bid, and fitting that unpredictable seasonal narrative, Maryland clinched an NCAA bid with another win against North Carolina, this time in the first round of the ACC tournament. Compared to the previous win over North Carolina, Bias’s performance was more steady than dramatic: 20 points and a career-high 13 rebounds. Still, he reached a much-anticipated milestone and became Maryland’s all-time leading scorer with 2,072 points. Juan Dixon and Greivis Vasquez have since surpassed Bias on Maryland’s all-time scoring list.

Excerpted from the book, Born Ready: the Mixed Legacy of Len Bias

Learn about the Born Ready Project that teaches life skills, using Len’s legacy as a teaching tool.

Dean Dome Dominance

“God was with us tonight”

Needing to win three of its last four ACC games in 1986 for a chance at an NCAA tournament bid, Maryland traveled to Chapel Hill to meet top-ranked North Carolina in late February. For a team trying to recover from its worst conference start in history and a recent suspension to its star player, nothing could seem more daunting a task than beating the top team in the country on their court. Against North Carolina, Bias showed why a basketball guru such as Red Auerbach promised he would try to make him a member of his Celtics team. With Maryland down by nine with just under three minutes remaining in regulation, Bias hit a medium-range jumper, then converted a dunk after stealing the inbounds pass.

With Maryland ahead by one and about 15 seconds remaining in overtime, he helped secure the win by blocking a driving jump shot in the lane by Kenny Smith. Bias finished with 35 points, leading Maryland to a 77-72 win in overtime. It was the signature game of his college career: winning a game few thought Maryland could win, against the best team in the country, in front of more than 21,000 people in the “Dean Dome,” the most daunting arena in the conference – one named after its then-head coach, Dean Smith, no less. “God was with us tonight and God means Len Bias,” Gatlin said at the time. Gatlin scored Maryland’s last four points in the game after Bias’s block.

Excerpted from the book, Born Ready: the Mixed Legacy of Len Bias

Learn about the Born Ready Project that teaches life skills, using Len’s legacy as a teaching tool.

50 for 50 – Len Bias’ Golden Moments #17…Senior Setback

Bias is Suspended After Missing Curfew

Things seemed to be on the upswing when Maryland beat Clemson to win its second consecutive ACC game, then traveled to Raleigh to play N. C. State. Bias scored a team-high 21 points and made two free throws with about a minute and a half left that helped clinch the one-point win for Maryland. Having now won three consecutive ACC games, Maryland was on a bit of a roll. But that momentum fizzled after coach Lefty Driesell suspended Bias and teammates Jeff Baxter and John Johnson for violating a team curfew after the N.C. State game.

Media reports said the three players returned at about 4 a.m. to Maryland’s hotel after watching a replay of the game at a friend’s room on the N.C. State campus, but that’s not what happened. Baxter admits that the three were actually at an off-campus party with an N.C. State player whose name he declined to make public. He insists that neither he, Bias nor Johnson drank alcohol or took drugs.

The party included what Johnson calls a “Freak Momma” contest set up to select the most attractive female. “We were just dancing. And we had a ball,” Baxter says with a laugh. “We were pumped up that we won the game. I still remember to this day how much fun that was.” Baxter added that they returned to the hotel by about 1 a.m. and were greeted by Maryland’s assistant coaches and Driesell, who asked, as Baxter delicately put it, “ ‘Where the bleep, bleep have you been?’ We knew we weren’t supposed to be out, but we didn’t think the impact would be anything big. For me, it was, OK, we didn’t do anything. We didn’t think it was a big deal.” Driesell benched Bias, Baxter and Johnson for the next game, a loss to Clemson.

Excerpted from the book, Born Ready: the Mixed Legacy of Len Bias

Learn about the Born Ready Project that teaches life skills, using Len’s legacy as a teaching tool.

Find out about the Born Ready Hoops Festival  Nov. 22-24, that will honor Len’s legacy as a basketball player.

50 for 50 – Len Bias’ Golden Moments #15…Staying Put

Bias Chooses to Stay at Maryland for His Senior Year

Bias enjoyed a trio of post-season accolades in 1985: He was voted ACC Player of the Year, all-ACC and a third-team All-America, offering sweet redemption for not being named all-ACC the previous season and creating a swirl of speculation that he might enter the NBA draft the following summer. But on May 2,

Bias settled the uneasy nerves of Maryland fans and coaches by saying he would indeed stay in College Park for another year. His decision came after coach Lefty Driesell requested that his good friend Red Auerbach talk to Bias. Auerbach dined with Bias and his parents and all agreed that he would return to Maryland.

Auerbach, of course, had told Bias after the previous summer that would do everything he could to make him a Celtic, but the Celtics had the 20th pick of the 1985 draft, and certainly Auerbach must have known the chances were slim that Bias, as the ACC Player of the Year whose upside still featured plenty of positive growth potential, would still be available.

In a Boston Globe story published the day after Bias died, Auerbach detailed his dinner discussion with Bias. “I told Lefty when he set the dinner up I would tell the kid the truth, and not to expect me to tell the kid to go back to Maryland for his final year if I did not think he had anything to gain by going back as a senior. When we met, I told Len how I felt. I told them that if he came out in the draft, he would not be drafted in the top 10. I thought he would go around 15th. I told him, on the other hand, if he stayed in school for another year, he would be one of the top choices in the draft, certainly in the top seven, putting him in the lottery, and that we might have a chance to get him. He told me he would love that. He would love to play for the Celtics.”

Excerpted from the book, Born Ready: the Mixed Legacy of Len Bias

Learn about the Born Ready Project that teaches life skills, using Len’s legacy as a teaching tool.

Staying Home

Bias Picks Maryland, but he was close to joining the Wolfpack

If any school stood a good chance of stealing Bias away from the Terps, it was ACC rival N.C. State. At the time, the Wolfpack featured Dereck Whittenburg and Sidney Lowe, teammates at DeMatha High School who were Bias’s good friends, as well as local basketball rivals. “By the end of the visit, I knew I wanted to go to State,” Bias said in a Washington Post  story in 1985. “That’s the last thing I told Coach Valvano when I left.”

Those words from Bias to Valvano as he said goodbye to the coach left Valvano in a dreamy state.  “Are you kidding? I remember him hugging me at the airport and saying he was coming,” Valvano said in the Post  story. “I said, ‘Don’t tell me that. I’ll get too excited.’ If we had gotten that kid …”

It turned out, however, that no college could compete with the passion Bias felt for Maryland combined with the influence James Bias had on his son. The elder Bias liked the fact that it would be easy for Len’s three younger siblings to watch their big brother play so close to home. “He had great respect for his father,” says Johnnie Walker, his mentor. “The fact is, his father wanted him to stay home and go to Maryland. Len didn’t make the decision to go to Maryland.”

Driesell, for one, felt little concern that Bias might attend another school. “He wasn’t like Tom McMillen and had everyone recruiting him,” says Driesell, referring to the former Maryland player, eventual All-America and Rhodes Scholar who was the top high-school recruit in the country in 1970. “I felt good that he liked Maryland. He hung out there all the time.”

To the surprise of few, Bias signed with Maryland in mid-April 1982.

Excerpted from the book, Born Ready: the Mixed Legacy of Len Bias

Learn about the Born Ready Project that teaches life skills, using Len’s legacy as a teaching tool.