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Wesleyan Christian Academy introduced Keith Gatlin of Greensboro as its boys basketball coach Tuesday.

If the name rings a bell, well, it should.

Gatlin was a star high school basketball player at D.H. Conley in Greenville, where he earned state player of the year and McDonald's All-America honors back in 1983. He went on to play ACC basketball as Maryland's point guard. He never made it to the NBA, but he played pro ball for 11 teams on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean from 1988 through 2001.

Plug Gatlin's name into Google, and the first thing that pops up is this YouTube video clip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7tvAi-xCFtE

It's the final play of Maryland's 77-72 overtime victory at North Carolina in February 1986. Gatlin scores an easy layup after catching his own inbounds pass by bouncing it off the back of Carolina defender Kenny Smith.

Even now, 23 years later, Gatlin says people still ask him about that play.

"That happened as a fluke," Gatlin said Tuesday. "We practiced that play the night before. Our second team was running the Carolina defense, and back then Carolina always turned their back to the inbound passer to deny the pass and try to get a five-second count. So (in practice) Lefty (Driesell) was counting, and I panicked … and threw it off John Johnson’s back and stepped back in. Everyone was, like, 'Wow.' So Lefty calls (ACC referee) Lenny Wertz and says, 'Hey, if we have this opportunity and we're in trouble, could we do that?' And he said as long as you step inbounds (before touching the ball) you can do it."

Gatlin didn't score much in college -- he didn't need to; he played with Len Bias, the best player to ever wear a Terps uniform -- but he graduated as Maryland's all-time assists leader (a record since broken by Steve Blake). Gatlin's game changed as a pro.

"You've got to score in Europe," he said Tuesday, "or you're coming home."

Gatlin has a wealth of basketball knowledge to pass on to his Wesleyan players.

"It's a different breed of kids now," Gatlin said. "Kids today want to shoot the 3-pointer or dunk the ball. Most kids don't understand the mid-range game, and that's where you win. If you can make your 2-pointers and be real efficient, you're going to be good. Kobe Bryant is the best player in the game right now, and very seldom does he shoot threes. His mid-range game is incredible. It's hard to make kids understand that."

-- JEFF MILLS, Staff Writer

While the rest of the tennis world focused on Roger Federer's record-setting run at Wimbledon last week, Greensboro native John Isner quietly returned to competition at a Challenger Tour event in the Chicago suburbs.

He lost.

But after sitting out almost seven weeks, just being back on the court was a little victory.

Isner hadn't played since losing a quarterfinal match to Alex Kuznetsov at a Challenger tournament in Savannah, Ga., on May 8. A few days later, Isner was diagnosed with mononucleosis.

He missed the French Open. He missed Wimbledon.

The Grand Slams loss was Winnetka's gain. The little tournament in Illinois made the big-serving, 6-foot-9 Isner the top seed at the Neilsen USTA Pro Tennis Championships.

But the rust of all that inactivity showed up as Isner lost to Ryler DeHeart in the first round, 6-4, 7-6 (4).

DeHeart, by the way, advanced all the way to the semifinals of the tournament, which Kuznetsov won.

Isner fared a little better in doubles. He and partner Brendan Evans -- the second seeds -- won a first-round match against Kuznetsov and Tim Smyczek 3-6, 6-2, 10-8.

Isner and Evans lost to wild-cards Brett Joelson and Ryan Sweeting in the quarterfinals, 6-4, 4-6, 10-5.

Isner, the former Page and Georgia star, will play in a non-sanctioned event in New York and practice hard at his Tampa, Fla., home to get ready for the next big test: the ATP Tour's Indianapolis Championships, which start July 19.

-- JEFF MILLS, Staff Writer

I wasn't fortunate enough to be on hand for last night's eventful ninth inning in the game between the Hoppers and the West Virginia Power. It resulted in the eventual ejection of Greensboro manager Darin Everson, so let's try to summarize from the box score and Brian Joura's article in today's N&R.

1) The Hoppers were up 7-3 after a six-run seventh inning, only to give up eight in the ninth to go down 11-7.

2) The Hoppers put together a rally in the bottom of the ninth. A Justin Jacobs two-run double got them within two, at which point chaos ensued. Here's what apparently happened.

The West Virginia coaching staff went out to the mound for the second time in the inning to visit pitcher Yoffri Martinez. For those who don't know all the particulars of baseball's rules, you are allowed one free visit per inning to talk to your pitcher. If you switch pitchers, then that new pitcher also gets one free visit in the inning. So basically, you can visit each pitcher once within a certain inning and let him stay in the game.

On the second visit to the mound in the same inning with the same pitcher, you must remove him from the game. Here is the rule from the MLB rule book: 

8.06 A professional league shall adopt the following rule pertaining to the visit of the manager or coach to the pitcher:
(a) This rule limits the number of trips a manager or coach may make to any one pitcher in any one inning;
(b) A second trip to the same pitcher in the same inning will cause this pitcher’s automatic removal;

Now, here is rule 8.03 from the rule book, which deals with how many warmup pitches each pitcher gets upon a pitching change.

When a pitcher takes his position at the beginning of each inning, or when he relieves another pitcher, he shall be permitted to pitch not to exceed eight preparatory pitches to his catcher during which play shall be suspended. A league by its own action may limit the number of preparatory pitches to less than eight preparatory pitches. Such preparatory pitches shall not consume more than one minute of time.

If a sudden emergency causes a pitcher to be summoned into the game without any opportunity to warm up, the umpire-in-chief shall allow him as many pitches as the umpire deems necessary.

I italicized that last part because it represents the exception. If there is an emergency (usually when the current pitcher is either injured or ejected), then the new pitcher can warm up pretty much as long as he wants.

Now, here is manager Darin Everson's quote from Joura's article: 

"He had two visits....On the second visit they need to automatically bring the pitcher in and they did not go get the pitcher. They ran another pitcher out there to get ready" 

And here is another excerpt from the article: "Pitching coach Charlie Corbell indicated new pitcher Owen Brolsma was not even up when Green went out to the mound for a second time. '(The umpire) let him throw about 10 pitches,' Corbell said." 

I called Hoppers media relations intern Will Cornelius to check this because I wasn't there, and he said the issue was that when the West Virginia coach went to the mound, the umpire did not immediately signal the new pitcher into the game, who according to Everson and Corbell was not ready. Instead, Brolsma threw some more pitches in the bullpen before coming into the game and getting his allotted number of warmup pitches from the actual mound.

So presumably what upset Everson so much, and led to the ejection, was that the West Virginia coach made his second visit - perhaps accidentally - without having anyone completely ready to enter the game. It seems Everson was arguing that this was a mistake on the part of the manager, and therefore the new pitcher should not have been allowed those extra warmup throws in the pen, but should have had to immediately come into the game and throw the alloted number that a normal reliever gets.

I was down at the park talking to Everson today for another story, and he comically avoided the initial question, but said that he had never seen that specific event happen before. He did say, though, that he has seen other such procedural oddities during his time in baseball.

Perhaps only baseball nuts will find this interesting, but I've never heard of something like that happening before -- pretty comical.

--Jesse Baumgartner

The Hoppers will have four representatives in West Virginia for tonight’s All-Star Game.

Closer Pete Andrelczyk, starter Johnny Dorn, first baseman Ben Lasater and third baseman Paul Gran were all selected for the team. Here are their stats at the break:

Lasater: .309 BA, .932 OPS 11 HR, 46 RBI, 25 2B

Gran: .257 BA, 2 HR, 17 RBI, 7 SB, 132B

Dorn: 7-5, 3.15 ERA, 85.2 IP, 54 K, 1.23 WHIP

Andrelczyk: 1.35 ERA, 50 K and 8 BB in 33.1 IP, 12 SV, 1.02 WHIP

This is a good time to take a look at the Hoppers at the halfway point.

Pitching has been up and down, and the team ERA of 3.91 ranks 11th out of 16 teams in the South Atlantic League. Dorn has certainly been the steady hand in that area and probably deserves better than his 7-5 record. The Hoppers are also hanging in tough in the standings because Andrelczyk has been lockdown when it comes to that crucial ninth inning.

It's at the plate that this team stands out, especially when it comes to the long ball. Lasater started off red-hot and currently leads the league with his 25 doubles, but it’s the overall power in the lineup that keeps them in a lot of ball games. Take a week ago at home, for example, when they trailed Hickory by two heading into the last-at bat, only to win with two bombs by Kevin Mattison and Jeremy Synan.

Check this stat out – the Hoppers have hit 69 homers this season, and the next highest team in the SAL is Greenville, at 48. That’s a quite a gap. Lasater (11), Justin Bass (11), Synan (10) and Mattison (10) all have double-digit homers this season. Those guys combined have hit as many or more homers than 13 of the league’s other 15 teams.

Bottom Line: This group struggled for a bit a few weeks ago, but they got things together before the break and sit tied for second in the Northern Division – six games behind Lakewood. The BlueClaws went 8-2 in their last 10 games, but didn’t open up a huge lead because the Hoppers went 7-3 themselves in that span and currently have a three-game winning streak. But even with the balls flying out of the park like they have been, this team will need to improve the pitching if they want to make a run.
 

-Jesse Baumgartner

After four days of qualifying, the main draw at Wimbledon was set Friday — and Greensboro native John Isner's name isn't one of the 128 in the gentlemen's singles bracket.

The mononucleosis that kept Isner out of the French Open last month is all but gone. But the lost time cost the 24-year-old Page alumnus any chance at booming 140-mph serves at the All England Club.

"I missed the cut by two people," Isner said Friday from his Florida home. "Since I didn’t get into the main draw right away, I could have gone over and tried to get in through qualifying. But I haven’t had any practice, especially on grass, so I just had to bag it. With no practice, I wouldn’t have stood much of a chance."

Isner hasn't played since May 8, when fatigue caught up with him in the quarterfinals of a Challenger tournament in Savannah, Ga., and he lost to Alex Kuznetsov 7-6 (3), 2-6, 5-7.

Isner's mononucleosis was diagnosed the next week.

If the Wimbledon draw process started over this week, the 6-foot-9, big-serving Isner would be a shoo-in. He was No. 114 in the ATP world rankings when he fell ill, but after six weeks of inactivity Isner is up to No. 99.

"That's crazy, isn't it?" Isner said. "I’ve climbed 15 spots in the world rankings since I've been out. It's weird how it works. I didn't do well at the French (Open) or Wimbledon last year, and my ranking fell off a lot. I actually did better in terms of ranking by not playing them this year. I don't know how they figure it."

It's Isner's first top-100 singles ranking since July 21, 2008. His best ranking was No. 81 on April 14, 2008.

Just because he didn't get a Wimbledon invitation, don't expect Isner to sit home with his size 15 feet propped up on the coffee table.

"I don't feel 100 percent like I did a couple of months ago, but I'm much better," Isner said. "I feel like I'm in somewhat fighting shape right now."

Isner will return to tennis at a Challenger tournament in Winnetka, Ill. — a Chicago suburb — that conincides with the second week of Wimbledon. He'll follow that with a non-sanctioned tournament in New York the next week, then a week of practice in Florida to get ready for the ATP Indy Championships in Indianapolis.

"I need matches," Isner said. "Once you play some matches, you know you're going to be a little sore. Matches are a lot different than practice. No matter how you practice, you can't simulate how matches affect you."

Isner, a college star at Georgia who turned pro in 2007, is 9-6 in ATP matches this season. He’s 7-1 in Challenger Tour matches, and he won the tour stop in Tallahassee, Fla., in April for his third career Challenger title.

-- JEFF MILLS, Staff Writer, 373-7024 or jeff.mills@news-record.com

You'll start seeing a lot of Greensboro Grasshoppers material in this blog from now on, so we'll open things up with the unique opportunity on the table tonight at NewBridge Bank Park - a doubleheader starting at 5:05 p.m., with each game going seven innings.

The Hoppers have been lucky enough this year to incur the wrath of Mother Nature a fair bit (they even played a a triple header of sorts during a recent road trip). But back to tonight, your ticket will get you into BOTH games. Which means you're getting around 50% more baseball for the price of your ticket. You should also get some sort of badge of honor for watching 14 innings, in my opinion. Probably for playing 14, too.

A couple quick random tidbits heading into tonight's game vs. Kannapolis.

• The Hoppers are 5-4 in their past nine games and trail Lakewood by six games in the SAL's Northern Division.
• Catcher Kyle Skipworth, the No. 6 overall pick last season who has struggled throughout the year, is hitting.308 in his last ten games to raise his average to .203 - above the dreaded Mendoza line. He's looked better at the plate, too, even on some of his outs during recent home games. You'd assume he'll only be catching one of tonight's games and maybe DH'ing the other, since 14 frames behind the plate will really do some special things for your knees.
• Kevin Mattison is having a nice season on the basepaths with 18 swipes -- tied for fifth in the league. But he doesn't even have half as many as Lakewood's Anthony Gose, who already has 39 (and five triples). Talking with Hoppers manager Darin Everson after a Lakewood game a couple weeks ago, we were marveling at Gose's speed. The kid can absolutely fly -- both around the bases and in center field. He's worth watching when the BlueClaws come back to town in......let me check.....never mind they don't. You lost your chance.

Rusty LaRue, a three-sport star during his playing days at Wake Forest, has been hired as an assistant coach for the Demon Deacons basketball team.

LaRue, who was inducted into the Wake Forest Sports Hall of Fame last year, will replace Pat Kelsey on head coach Dino Gaudio's staff. Kelsey left Wake in April to take the associate head coach at Xavier.

"We are thrilled to have Rusty join our staff," Gaudio said in a statement released Wednesday by the university. "... As a student-athlete he excelled in the classroom as well as on the court and fields of competition. No student-athlete has better represented what Wake Forest is all about better than Rusty. He will be a great addition to our staff as a coach and recruiter and will serve as a terrific mentor and role model not only to the basketball players but to all of the student-athletes at Wake Forest."

As a junior in 1995, LaRue became the first athlete since 1952 and just the second in ACC history to compete in football, basketball and baseball in the same year.

On the basketball court, LaRue was a member of Wake Forest's back-to-back ACC championship teams in 1995 and 1996. He is one of seven players in program history to play in four NCAA Tournaments.

From 1993-96, LaRue scored 667 career points and made 151 career three-point field goals. He currently ranks seventh all-time at Wake Forest in both career three-point field goals and three-point attempts. His career three-point percentage of 43.4 percent is the fifth-best mark in school history.

After college, LaRue played five seasons in the NBA for the Chicago Bulls -- he was a member of the 1998 championship team -- the Utah Jazz and the Golden State Warriors. LaRue also played professionally in Italy and Russia.

LaRue was named to the ACC Basketball Legends Class of 2006.

LaRue also played football and baseball for Wake Forest. A four-year letterwinner at quarterback from 1992-95, LaRue set school and ACC records that still stand including marks for total offensive yards, total offensive plays, pass attempts, pass completions and passing yards in a game. He finished his football career with 5,016 career passing yards, the fifth-highest total in school history.

In 1995, LaRue pitched in one game for the baseball team, earning a save with three innings of two-hit relief in a win over Furman.

LaRue also excelled in the classroom, earning Academic All-ACC honors, winning the ACC Scholarship Award and an NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship. He was named Wake Forest's Male Scholar-Athlete of the Year in 1996 and was also selected as the Arnold Palmer Award winner as a senior.

Following his professional basketball playing days, LaRue spent one season as the head men's basketball coach at Greensboro College in 2004-05.

Most recently, LaRue was the athletics director and head boys' basketball coach at Forsyth Country Day School in Winston-Salem. He also runs the Rusty LaRue Basketball Academy Triad Pro-Am Summer League, as well as youth basketball camps and travel teams.

LaRue, 35, grew up in Kernersville. He graduated from Wake Forest in 1996 with a degree in computer science.

-- Jeff Mills, Staff Writer

By now, the story of Barack Obama's campaign stop in Chapel Hill for a pickup game with the Tar Heels is well known. So, too, is the story of Obama's NCAA tournament bracket, in which the leader of the free world correctly picked North Carolina to win the national championship.

Monday afternoon, those same Tar Heels met with Obama again -- this time at the White House for a congratulatory ceremony with the president.

A certain senior on that team made a lasting impression on Obama. Jack Wooten, a walk-on from Burlington, wasn't a star for the Heels. But neither was he intimidated.

"When we played, everybody went out of their way to pass me the ball, set screens for me, let me take a shot," Obama said. "Tyler (Hansbrough) chose not to block my shot, but I was so intimidated by him being near me that I missed it.

"There was one exception, though: Jack Wooten," Obama added. "He stole the ball from me, he blocked my shot, he fouled me once -- coach (Roy) Williams had to remind him that there were a bunch of guys with guns around. But just to show that there are no hard feelings, Jack, I want to congratulate you. He made Phi Beta Kappa this year, that's worth applauding. To achieve academic excellence as part of a national championship is extraordinary. And I know that Jack is interested in public service and we need more young people like him to serve our country. So, Jack, any time you're ready, jump on board."

Wooten, who was a star guard in high school at Williams in Burlington, had one of the more memorable one-liners of the season when he spoke at North Carolina's basketball awards banquet in April. His role, like the vast majority of walk-ons at all 343 Division I programs across the country, was to play hard on the scout team, imitating as best he could an opposing team's player.

"During my time here, I learned to guard five positions," the 6-foot-2, 190-pound Wooten said. "Point guard. Shooting guard. Small forward. Power forward. And president."

Photos and complete text of Obama's presentation: http://northcarolina.scout.com/2/864163.html

-- JEFF MILLS, Staff Writer

Now that North Carolina juniors Ty Lawson and Wayne Ellington are officially off to The League, the Tar Heels and coach Roy Williams have an extra scholarship available to help fill out the 2009-'10 roster.

So, Roy, what will you do with it?

"In the spring time, all the players -- or at least a huge, huge majority of players -- have already made their decisions," Williams said during Thursday's news conference to say goodbye to Lawson and Ellington. "So you can't prepare for (players leaving early), but it is what it is."

Not everyone has made a decision this spring. There's a certain 6-foot-4, 184-pound high school senior in the Tar Heels' back yard who hasn't signed a letter of intent yet. Maybe you've heard of him: His name is John Wall and he happens to be one of the top-rated recruits in the nation. The top-rated player by some services.

And Wall is a point guard, seemingly a perfect fit for a North Carolina group Williams called "thinner on the perimeter than any team I've had at this time of the year."

But the Raleigh Word of God senior is almost certainly a one-and-done player. Would the Heels still be interested (if Wall were interested in them, of course)?

These days, players leaving early for the NBA is "something that you do prepare for," Williams said. "When we're recruiting, I want a good mix. I want to get guys who can shoot, guys who can defend, but I want to also get guys who are so good that they'll have this question mark after every year and some who I feel will be with us the whole time. There's no general rule that's good for everybody."

By the way, Wall has reportedly narrowed his choices to eight schools -- Kentucky, Kansas, Baylor, Memphis and four from the ACC: Miami, Duke, N.C. State ... and North Carolina.

-- Jeff Mills, Staff Writer

The spring football game at N.C. State was much more than a glorified practice this season. Named for the late Kay Yow, admission to Saturday's scrimmage at Carter-Finley Stadium was free but donations were accepted to help fund the fight against breast cancer.

And that brings us to a rumor I sincerely hope is untrue. I didn't see it with my own eyes, but I and others heard that someone was wandering the parking lots selling fake pink tickets to the tailgaters so they could get into the game.

If that's true, that's despicable.

And if that's true, I sincerely hope they catch the grifter and make the punishment fit the crime: Make the perp serve as a tackling dummy at a couple of N.C. State practices.

-- JEFF MILLS, Staff Writer