As far as public tirades go, Connecticut head coach Jim Calhoun made Howard Dean look like an amateur Saturday afternoon.

Upset after the No. 6 Huskies’ second loss in three games, Calhoun lashed out at New Haven Register columnist Dave Solomon during a postgame press conference for asking a question that hit Calhoun in a bad way.

‘Jim, recruiting is hardly an exact science,’ Solomon asked after the Huskies’ 66-56 loss to No. 23 Providence (14-3, 5-1 Big East). ‘What does Gomes do that blows you away now, that maybe no one saw?’

‘I’ve explained it a thousand times. I fucked up. I didn’t take Ryan Gomes. Does that make you happy?’ Calhoun said in response to Solomon’s question. ‘It took Wayne Simone (Gomes’ AAU coach) 18 months to convince (Friars coach) Tim Welsh to take the kid. I don’t know what else you want me to say. I fucked up. Write it. I fucked up, for the fifth time.’

Providence forward Ryan Gomes is a Connecticut native who Calhoun passed up while recruiting two years ago. Gomes put up 17 points in the first half and finished the game with a double-double en route to Providence’s fifth-straight win. Gomes also attended Calhoun’s basketball camp when the forward was in ninth grade, something Solomon pointed out in his follow-up column.

But Calhoun made it known that, at the time, it seemed more reasonable to recruit current UConn juniors Emeka Okafor and Caron Butler instead of Gomes. Now he realizes he made a mistake.

Since the Connecticut loss, the video clip of Calhoun’s rant has run on television stations cross the country.

‘You can’t be prepared for a response like that,’ Solomon said. ‘It wasn’t really expected. That’s all I’ll say.’

Obviously, Solomon is upset, but he is not as upset with Calhoun as he is with other members of the press, who have misrepresented and misstated the question that he asked Calhoun.

‘It was basically that the question I asked was misinterpreted,’ Solomon said. ‘People were writing about it without knowing the question.’

In his column, which ran in yesterday’s New Haven Register, Solomon didn’t bash Calhoun, but took shots at the reporters who made him appear as if he were the antagonist of the situation. According to Solomon, one of the ESPN reporters who called him hadn’t read Solomon’s game story nor did he know the controversial question.

‘The story has taken on a life of its own since then, and I’ve never seen so much misinformation in my life,’ Solomon said in his column. ‘There were fifth cousins of someone in section 999 of the Civic Center that seemed to know for sure that Calhoun prefaced his postgame remarks by forbidding questions about Ryan Gomes, the Providence College standout out of Waterbury.’

Solomon said he did not intend to incite any trouble with Calhoun, whom Solomon has had, and still believes he has, a good relationship with. He fears that dissenters on message boards and call-in radio shows are intending to make the issue something more than it is.

After a phone call from Calhoun on Sunday, a call which Solomon prefers to keep private, the 18-year Connecticut coach publicly apologized in a media teleconference.

‘I think he meant everything,’ Solomon said. ‘I thought he was genuinely sorry, but I didn’t feel from my point that he needed to apologize. It was that simple.’

A win for the rule book

Thanks to an ‘unspecified’ game, the Big East has amended its rule regarding fans rushing the court after the conclusion of games. The explanation of the rule makes it rather obvious what Big East school officials had in mind while devising the new rule.

‘Team B leads, 67-66,’ the Big East rulebook states. ‘A1’s two-point try for goal is successful. Two seconds remain on the game clock. Assuming that the successful try was a game-ending and winning goal, bench personnel and fans from Team A go onto the court and celebrate. RULING: When the celebration causes a delay by preventing the ball from being promptly made live, a technical foul shall be assessed to the offending team.’

In other words, assuming Pitt sinks both free throws, Pitt ties Syracuse, 67-67, perhaps leading to one of the most heartbreaking defeats in SU history. Good thing for SU the rule was made at the beginning of this season and not last year.

Tropical Depression

The St. John’s Red Storm has lost its last six games, which have all been to Big East opponents. St. John is the only team in the Big East without a win in conference play. Its last win came on Jan. 3 to Niagara.

Its latest loss came on Saturday to Rutgers, which snapped its own three-game losing streak with the 78-70 win. Rutgers (10-6, 2-4) had not beaten the Red Storm in eight years.

St. John’s (4-12, 0-6) will play West Virginia tonight. The Red Storm has won the last four meetings.

This and that

Providence’s wins this weekend over No. 6 UConn and Georgetown put the Friars in a tie for first place in the Big East with No. 7 Pittsburgh. Both teams stand at 5-1. … D’or Fisher blocked a school-record eight shots for West Virginia in its 65-62 victory over Boston College. … If the five Conference USA teams that committed to the Big East joined the conference today, the Big East would have six teams – No. 4 Louisville, No. 6 UConn, No. 7 Pitt, No. 8 Cincinnati, No. 20 Syracuse and No. 23 Providence – in the Associated Press Top 25. … After 161 blocks, Connecticut junior Emeka Okafor needs only 86 more to pass Patrick Ewing as the all-time leading blocker in Big East history.

Published on January 27, 2004 at 12:00 pm