Late-Blooming Violets

As a capricious basketball season came to a close, a capricious team wavered into preeminence. Wyoming and Notre Dame, early-season powerhouses, had blown their fuses. Now N.Y.U., with theatrical laterally wins over St. John's (58-54) and Temple (59-57) and a rout of Baylor (72-57), had emerged as the nation's best.

The man behind New York University's late-blooming Violets was modest, blunt, hokum-hating Coach Howard ("Jake") Cann. Scornful of modern mastermind "systems," for 22 years he has coached the same kind of ball he played a quarter-century ago, when he was one of basketball's greats. He seldom diagrams a play. Once, pressed to explain his "N.Y.U. system," he deadpanned: "Well, we throw the ball around a lot and do our best to put it in the basket." His real formula: hold the score down, wear 'em out, then pour it on.

Such tactics result in many photo-finishes, and Jake Cann, never resigned to them, habitually agonizes on the bench. Says he: "My greatest thrill comes when I hear the final whistle." This year, the thrills have been pleasant: 17 out of 18 final whistles have found N.Y.U. ahead.

Jake's 1946 team has been largely without honor in its own town. Their team play is intermittently sloppy, and occasionally they go in for grandstanding. Madison Square Garden crowds and sportswriters frequently hoot them. But Jake's second-half wonders, led by eagle-eyed Sid Tanenbaum, go on throwing the ball around a lot, and winning games.

They will have to prove their claim to the national championship a fortnight hence, at the intersectional N.C.A.A. tournament in their hometown Garden. Chief threat (if invited): Oklahoma A. & M., champs of the Missouri Valley, coached by stern Hank Iba, whose players call him "Sir." A. & M.'s crack team (which has lost only two games) is paced by 7-ft., high-scoring (58 points in one game) Bob Kurland, whose "dunk shot" is thrown down through the hoop, not up to it. Another contender: Ohio State, the Big Ten victor (won 14, lost 4).

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