USD tries to move beyond scandal
USD senior guard Darian Norris ultimately decided to come to San Diego to finish his college basketball career two years ago. ... The next day, USD coach Bill Grier called and Norris came to the Toreros instead, playing for team that finished 6-24 while the Aztecs were going 34-3. USD was embroiled in a game-fixing scandal; SDSU was reaching the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Tournament.
“I mean, sometimes I think about it,” Norris says. “Last year they had that great season. But I’m happy where I am. I love my teammates.” And the Toreros love him.
With 6-foot-11 center Chris Gabriel dismissed from the team last week, and until any of USD’s promising youngsters prove themselves, Norris is its only senior and only proven big-time Division I player. He led the team in scoring, assists, steals and minutes last season. He runs the offense. He covers the opponent’s best perimeter player. If the backup point comes in, he stays on the floor and moves to shooting guard. In other words, the issue for the Toreros isn’t Norris. It’s everyone else.
The season opens tonight against Stephen F. Austin at the Jenny Craig Pavilion, and Grier will start a true freshman, a redshirt freshman and a sophomore who has one previous career start. A true freshman and two other redshirt freshmen will come off the bench. ... Complicating that are plans to give heavy minutes to true freshmen Johnny Dee and Chris Anderson, who are (generously) listed at 6-0 and 5-7. Dee, the Rancho Buena Vista High alum, will start at shooting guard, and Grier says Anderson will get about 20 minutes per game. And sometimes, Grier admits, he’ll have both on the floor with the 6-0 Norris. Hard to imagine a Division I team going smaller than that.
With Gabriel jettisoned, Chris Manresa becomes the main (and maybe only) interior threat, but that’s if or when his lower back problems subside. A month ago, Grier raved about how his 6-9, 245-pound junior forward had rededicated himself over the summer and improved both his game and body. Then the latter betrayed him, with a herniated disc forcing him to miss big chunks of the preseason. He practiced only twice in the past week and is not expected to start against Stephen F. Austin. “Right now he hasn’t had enough reps to get going,” Grier said. “In time, he’ll be a starter. But not until he gets this back thing figured out.”
The scandal - The next hearing in the game-fixing scandal isn’t until April, and no one on the current team has been implicated in the federal indictment. But it’s a shadow that figures to be hard to shake – particularly on the road, when every preview story and newscast no doubt will dredge up allegations of the school’s all-time leading scorer throwing games.
