Jerry Tarkanian, Hall of Fame coach at UNLV, dies at 84

(TNS) - Jerry Tarkanian, the droopy-eyed, towel-chomping college basketball coach who transformed Nevada Las Vegas into a glitzy powerhouse as he waged a decades-long war against the National Collegiate Athletic Association, died Wednesday. He was 84.

His son, Danny Tarkanian, told The Associated Press that his father had been fighting an infection since he was hospitalized Monday in Las Vegas with breathing difficulties.

Known as "Tark the Shark," Tarkanian never had a losing record in 38 seasons, finishing 988-228 overall, with a major-college mark of 778-202. He won four California junior college state championships and four times led UNLV to the Final Four of the NCAA tournament.

Tarkanian claimed one NCAA title victory on the basketball court, with his run-and-fun UNLV team of 1990. He split two in-court cases with the NCAA, losing a 5-4 U.S. Supreme Court decision but later earning a $2.5 million settlement.

Tarkanian's coaching talents, particularly his brilliance as a defensive tactician, were overshadowed by off-court controversies surrounding alleged recruiting violations and a wide range of other infractions that may have delayed his induction into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame until 2013.

In 1991, at the height of his success, Tarkanian abruptly announced his retirement after a Las Vegas newspaper published a photo of three of his UNLV players in a hot tub with a convicted bookmaker.

Tarkanian briefly coached the NBA's San Antonio Spurs before returning to college in 1995 at Fresno State, his alma mater. He retired for good in 2002.

He left three major-college schools _ Long Beach State, UNLV and Fresno State _ in varying states of infractions disarray, but he maintained that NCAA charges were trumped up by a governing body out to get him.

He once told the Los Angeles Times: "I'll resent them forever. That's in my blood."

Tarkanian vs. NCAA was the legal version of Ali vs. Frazier _ two combatants exchanging blows for decades. The feud's origins date to the early 1970s when Tarkanian, while coaching Long Beach State, penned critical columns for the local newspaper claiming the NCAA targeted smaller schools.

Tarkanian would later famously quip, "The NCAA is so upset at UCLA they'll put Northridge on two years' probation."

The coach never claimed he was a saint _ his problem, he said, was the hypocrisy. "In major college basketball, nine out of 10 teams break the rules ... the other one is in last place," he wrote.

The NCAA denied ever singling out Tarkanian.

"The issue of a vendetta against Jerry Tarkanian is an absolute myth," an NCAA spokesman once said. " ... Jerry Tarkanian has essentially gotten the same treatment everybody else has gotten."

In a 1992 profile of Tarkanian for the Times Sunday magazine, Michael J. Goodman wrote: "Tarkanian has a perfect record of conceding little, admitting less, confessing nothing and denying what seems undeniable. ... The person most responsible for Tarkanian's troubles is Tarkanian."

Tarkanian saw himself as a champion of lost causes and hard-luck cases. Slouch-shouldered, with sad-looking eyes that made him look almost forlorn, Tarkanian appealed to the downtrodden. He befriended high school coaches and wasn't afraid to recruit after dark in the toughest neighborhoods. Low grade-point averages didn't scare him either. He was one of the first coaches to heavily recruit African-Americans out of junior colleges, and he loved transfers from major programs.

"They already have their cars paid for ... I'm not kidding," he wrote in his 2005 memoir, "Runnin' Rebel."

Tarkanian had spectacular hits _ Larry Johnson, the catalyst of UNLV's national title team, was recruited out of Odessa College in West Texas _ and one mind-boggling miss.

Tarkanian took his most misguided risk in the mid-'80s on Lloyd Daniels, a troubled prodigy from New York.

"The problem with Lloyd," Tarkanian would write, "was he had a lot of problems."

Tarkanian overcame obstacles of his own. He was born Aug. 8, 1930, in Euclid, Ohio, the son of Armen and Rose Tarkanian, Armenians who immigrated to the United States to escape persecution from the Turks. After his father died of tuberculosis when Jerry was 10, the family moved to Pasadena, Calif.

Tarkanian played basketball at Pasadena High and Pasadena City College, earning a scholarship to Fresno State, where he was mostly a practice player and petty prankster. He met future wife Lois Huter, a member of the student court, when Jerry and accomplices were put on trial for pulling the electrical plug at a school dance.

Working summers at the National Biscuit Co. in Pasadena convinced Tarkanian he never wanted an ordinary job. He got his first job coaching basketball at Fresno's Edison High, then moved on to San Joaquin Memorial High in Fresno and Antelope Valley High in Lancaster, Calif., before landing at Redlands High in Redlands, Calif. _ where the legend of the towel-chomp was born.

Tarkanian said it all started at a 1960 league championship game, in a sweltering gym with no air conditioning. Tired of repeated trips to the water fountain, the coach soaked a towel and used it to quench his thirst. Redlands won, and the superstitious Tarkanian continued the ritual the rest of his career.

Tarkanian left Long Beach State on three years' probation. In 1977, the NCAA then targeted UNLV for alleged violations, ordering Tarkanian to be suspended two seasons. He received a court injunction to remain coach while the case worked its way through the system. In 1988, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled, 5-4, against Tarkanian, saying the NCAA was a voluntary organization and that if he didn't like the way it operated, he could quit.

Tarkanian didn't quit. The ruling did not require him to serve his original suspension, so he continued his battle against the NCAA, while forging a basketball dynasty at UNLV. The Rebels' success led to construction of a 19,000-seat arena, the Thomas & Mack Center, with the local glitterati convened in a section called "Gucci Row."

Tarkanian was on the verge of becoming coach of the Los Angeles Lakers in 1979 when Vic Weiss, a childhood friend from Pasadena and his agent negotiating the deal, was found slain and stuffed in the back of his Rolls-Royce. Police suspected ties to organized crime, but the case remains unsolved. Tarkanian, shaken by the incident, turned down the Lakers.

His UNLV teams kept winning throughout the late '70s and early '80s. In 1986, though, the coach became infatuated by Daniels, whom Tarkanian said was Magic Johnson with a better jump shot.