Hansen's Sunday Notebook: McKale Center's birthday brings reminders of Arizona Wildcats' past

Happy birthday, McKale

McKale Center turned 45 last week and it triggered three thoughts:

1. Long-time Pima College humanities professor Rob Modica still sits in the same seats, Section 12, Row 15, as he did for the first game, Feb. 1, 1973.

Modica, now retired, is a fan of such degree that he sat through every game of the 4-24 season under Ben Lindsey (1982-83). He bought a mini-season ticket plan for the inaugural season, 1972-73, five games, and without prompting he remembered that Arizona scored 100 points in three of those games.

“I came to Tucson from Grand Rapids, Michigan, in 1960 and became a regular at Bear Down Gym,” he said. “I’ve been to McKale for all the big games: the McMiracle shot by Craig McMillan, the Duke games, the day Sean Elliott set the Pac-10 scoring record, and those remarkable days of Coniel Norman and Eric Money.”

2. The game has changed so much. Arizona went 4-1 in those first five games, when scores included 110-105, 101-95 and 100-94. “It was so loud then, as loud or louder as any time through the years,” Modica said. It was more entertaining, too. In that first mini-season at McKale, the UA averaged 97 points. It averaged 71 field-goal attempts per game (the UA has never averaged more than 57 shots under Sean Miller). And Norman, a freshman shooting whiz, had consecutive games of 37, 34, 26, 29 and 38 in those first five McKale Center games.

3. McKale Center opened even though Bear Down Gym was only 47 years old. Now the lifetime of a Pac-12 basketball arena goes on and on and on. Washington’s American Airlines Arena (more affectionately known as Hec Edmundson Pavilion) is 90. Cal’s Haas Pavilion is 85. Oregon State’s Gill Coliseum is 68. All have been touched up and renovated, but since McKale’s debut in 1973 — and that of ASU’s Wells Fargo Arena a year later — only Oregon and USC have built new arenas from the ground up.

Tucson’s three sports people of the week

1. Sam Merriman

In 1978, Merriman was an All-City linebacker/tackle at Amphitheater High School under Vern Friedli, in the same class with future NFL coach Chris Foerster of Sabino, UA receiver Jay Dobyns and NFL receiver Mark Mistler, both of Sahuaro.

Merriman signed with Idaho, then coached by ex-UA lineman Jerry Davitch. Merriman was sensational as a Vandal linebacker, making a school-record 519 tackles and being drafted by the Seattle Seahawks in 1983. He played five NFL seasons before a knee injury scuttled his career.

Now in the real estate business in Tucson — and a member of the Tucson Fiesta de los Vaqueros rodeo organizing committee — Merriman last week learned that he has been voted into the Idaho Sports Hall of Fame, Class of 2018. Well deserved.

2. Evan Nelson 

After sitting out the first half of the high school basketball season — Nelson is a transfer from Mountain View High School — he joined a Salpointe Catholic team that was 3-14. Remember, the Lancers played in the state championship game a year ago.

Since then, the Lancers are 6-1 and no one wants to play them when the postseason begins next week. Nelson, a point guard, was superb in a comeback victory over 23-5 Catalina Foothills on Thursday. He scored 36 points, 31 in the second half. A week earlier, he scored 30 against Rincon and is averaging 23.9 since he joined the Lancers. He’s a special, player, a cross between Santa Rita’s Terrell Stoglin and Palo Verde’s Bryce Cotton, who were first-team all-conference players in their days at Maryland and Providence. This summer, on the AAU circuit, it’s likely Nelson will be offered scholarships by Top 25 programs.

3. Jack Howell 

The former major-league third baseman from Palo Verde High School, Pima College and the UA returned to Tucson three times in January: for former coach Jerry Kindall‘s funeral and for alumni games with Arizona and PCC.

After spending the last 15 years as a hitting coach and instructor at both the major-league and minor-league levels for the Diamondbacks, Marlins and Mariners, Howell last week agreed to be a manager. He will manage the Angels’ Class A affiliate in Burlington, Vermont.

It’s a terrific story; Howell last managed in 2002 for Missoula, Montana, in the Pioneer League. Along the way, Howell was the hitting coach for the old Tucson Sidewinders. At 56, he’s still got it.

John Briscoe, Scott King die; both were memorable local sports figures

Two of Tucson’s top sports figures died last week.

John Briscoe was the captain of Arizona’s 1964 football team, a linebacker/tackle who played both ways and was drafted by the Cleveland Browns. He died last week in Walnut Creek, California. He was 75.

Briscoe, who was recruited to the UA in 1959 out of a small mining town in western Pennsylvania, went on to work for U.S. Steel in the Bay area. After he retired, he became an usher, working for both the San Francisco Giants and San Francisco 49ers.

At Arizona, the two-way starters of ‘64 were called “Briscoe’s Buccaneers”, a reflection on the fiery Briscoe.

Scott King was a key part of Rincon High School’s amazing basketball successes of the 1970s; the 6-foot 6-inch forward, son of Rincon High state championship coach Dick King, died last week in Tucson. He spent most of his career as an elementary school teacher in Tucson. He was 60.

King and his twin brother, Steve, led 27-1 Rincon to the 1976 state championship game against Chandler. And although Rincon lost 59-53, King had a double-double, with 10 points and 11 rebounds.

Kystal Quihuis leaves UA golf program

UA golf standout Krystal Quihuis announced on her Instagram account that she will not finish her senior season. Instead, she will play on the Symetra Tour, which is the LPGA’s version of the PGA’s Web.com Tour.

“I’m excited, scared, nervous, happy and ready to move forward with new goals and challenges,” she said.

Quihuis was a two-time state championship golfer at Salpointe Catholic High School. At Arizona, she was named 2015 Pac-12 Freshman of the Year and had 14 top-10 finishes in her 3½ college seasons. She qualified for the Symetra Tour in December.

There’s not a lot of money available on the Symetra Tour — last year’s No. 10 overall finisher earned $63,000 — but it’s a good path to the LPGA Tour. Fellow Salpointe grad Sara Brown Radley went from Michigan State to the Symetra Tour to the LPGA Tour, although Radley also played extensively in Europe.

Arizona coach Laura Ianello, who probably had a consensus top-10 team with Quihuis, now has to regroup. There is hope: Freshman Yu-Sang Hou, one of the world’s top female amateur golfers, will make her UA debut Feb. 11.

New UA offensive coordinator Noel Mazzone has long history with Wildcats

Arizona’s new offensive coordinator, Noel Mazzone, goes way back in his connections to Tucson. He started at quarterback for New Mexico in a 1977 game at Arizona Stadium, although Arizona beat the Lobos 15-13. He later was an offensive coordinator at North Carolina State under Chuck Amato, who was Arizona’s linebackers coach under Larry Smith in the early 1980s. When Mazzone coaches his first game for the Wildcats in September, it will be a different era. When he quarterbacked the Lobos at the stadium 41 years ago, the Wildcats completed just three passes.

Former Final Four Cat Eugene Edgerson was a student-teacher in Tucson, and his students remember

Two-time Arizona Final Four basketball player Eugene Edgerson graduated from the police academy last week and took the oath of office to be a policeman on the Pima Community College beat. In the UA’s 1999-2000 season, Edgerson voluntarily sat out, redshirting, so that he could complete student-teaching requirements at Tucson’s Borton Primary Magnet School. He made an impact there, too. Tucsonan Suzanne Myal last week told me that her grandson, Manuel Antonio Castro, was part of Edgerson’s class. Castro is now in his second year of a five year Ph.D. program at Vanderbilt University in the Medical Biochemistry Department. “Gene always had time for Mac and his friends and a pick-up basketball game,” Myal said.

UA golfer with Masters experience brings "championship stuff"

Arizona freshman golfer Tianlang Guan is known mostly for his remarkable success as a young teenager; at 14, he played in the 2013 Masters and made the cut, finishing just three strokes behind Phil Mickelson. Guan, who was recruited to Arizona by coach Jim Anderson, played with the UA starters in last week’s dazzling comeback victory to win the Arizona Intercollegiate championship over No. 3 Texas A&M and No. 6 Baylor, among others. Guan shot 75-72-71 in windy conditions. “Langly’s doing so well,” Anderson said. “He didn’t qualify in our team competition, but we picked him. It turned out to be a really good thing. We believe he’s clearly an outstanding player. In the final round, he went birdie, par, birdie to finish. That’s championship stuff.”

Season tickets a hit since Kevin Sumlin hiring

Arizona athletic director Dave Heeke last week said the school has sold 1,575 new season football tickets since it hired Kevin Sumlin. Given that there’s seven months until Arizona opens at home against BYU, there’s no rush to buy tickets. There’s no worry that tickets won’t be available. But it’s a strong indication that Tucsonans approve of Sumlin’s hire; it’s unlikely ASU sold a bunch of tickets when the hiring of Herm Edwards was announced. Sumlin is seen as a good hire, but the return of quarterback Khalil Tate will be as good as any marketing campaign implemented by the school.

Marsharne Flannigan creating something special at Palo Verde

When someone takes nominations for Tucson’s high school basketball coach of the year, Marsharne Flannigan should be prominently mentioned. Flannigan, a Tucson High grad, has coached the Palo Verde boys team to a 21-5 record, including a 10-0 run to end the regular season as the Titans await the playoffs. It’s been a tough rebuilding job for Flannigan, whose club was 10-14 a year ago. The Titans are led by the Sandoval brothers — Zion Sandoval averages 14.5 points and Taivonn Sandoval has 12.1 points per game. Flannigan is the uncle of Arizona safety Demetrius Flannigan-Fowles.

Kelvin Eafon, once a Holiday Bowl champ with UA, steps down as Pueblo hoops coach

Kelvin Eafon, the inspirational leader of Arizona’s 12-1 Holiday Bowl champions of the 1998 football season, has left his position as boys basketball coach at Pueblo High School. Eafon went 51-45 in four seasons at Pueblo, but the team slumped lately, finishing the season with nine consecutive losses.

Salpointe's Derick Bush heading to Carolina

Chase Gallagher, part of the football staff at Coastal Carolina University, helped the Chanticleers get a recruiting commitment from Salpointe Catholic defensive back Derick Bush last week. Gallagher played for Salpointe’s powerhouse teams of 2006-10. Bush had 59 tackles for Salpointe’s state championship finals team last season, and broke up 11 passes. Bush had eight scholarship offers, among them NAU and Weber State, before choosing the Chanticleers.

My two cents: Bobby Hurley's Devils are struggling, but they still have hope

The rise and fall of Bobby Hurley‘s Arizona State basketball team — from 12-0 and No. 3 in the nation to 4-6 in the Pac-12 — is almost without precedent in the conference.

In the last 25 seasons, only the 1996-97 Oregon Ducks had a similar out-of-nowhere story that turned sour by February.

The ‘97 Ducks, unranked, went 9-0 to open, rising to No. 17 in the AP poll. The Ducks then went 8-10 in the Pac-10 and lost a first-round NIT game to Hawaii.

The Ducks also lost a string of close games — losing by 1, 3, 3 and 5 points — as they fell from the Top 25. The Sun Devils have lost games by 3, 4, 4, 6 and twice lost in overtime.

Given time, it’s clear that the Kansas team ASU beat in December is not a vintage Jayhawks club.

But it’s not over. If ASU sweeps UCLA and USC at home this week, it will gather itself for a face-saving Feb. 15 home game against Arizona.

The game sold out three weeks ago.