Cooz

[stephen beauregard <sb@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/310/sports/Cousy_has_wheels_spinning+.shtml

Cousy has wheels spinning


By Stan Grossfeld, Globe Staff, 11/6/2001

ob Cousy, the ''Houdini of the Hardwood,'' has a game plan to escape the
ultimate foul trouble, death.


''If you get in that rocking chair and sit in front of the TV and become
a couch potato, I noticed you're out of here in a hurry,'' says the
Celtics legend.

So he arises each day between 5:30 and 6 a.m., sips some coffee, feeds
the French poodle, and lies on the carpet for 20 minutes of leg lifts
and stretches. Every other day, he drives to his alma mater, Holy Cross,
to lift weights and ride the exercise bike.

''It's like brushing your teeth,'' says the 74-year-old Hall of Famer.
''You develop a habit. I get out of bed and hit the floor. As we get
older, whatever regimen you can do helps.''

Cousy even thinks he can make it to 100. ''If I keep exercising ...''

He doesn't play basketball anymore, except in the driveway when the
grandchildren come over. Nor does he make any excuses.

''I do more than most at 74,'' says Cousy, who had a hip replacement
three years ago. ''I play a lot of golf. I'd love to get back to playing
tennis and racquetball, but that might not be until the next life.''

The Cooz says the secret to success is motivation.

''[Bill] Russell and I were self-motivated,'' he says. ''All of us came
out of the damn ghetto. [Red] Auerbach was a gutter kid, not fancy. I
was fabricated in France, and my mom was tough, surviving being three
months pregnant and throwing up in steerage on the crossing.''

Cousy was born in New York City and lived near the East River.

''The rats were bigger than we were,'' he says. ''I was in the street 12
hours a day. There were no hoops, just little parks. My dad was the kind
of guy who never panicked, not even if the house was on fire. My mom was
really high-strung, so I inherited a good combination of genes.''

He was an All-American in 1950 at Holy Cross, and he is back to his alma
mater for a workout on a recent day. It's still before 9 a.m. when
Cousy, dressed in sweats, T-shirt, and Holy Cross baseball cap, pulls
into the parking lot with a prediction.

''It's going to be all girls in here pumping iron,'' he says. ''The guys
are all sleeping. The girls have more motivation.''

Inside the Smith Wellness Center a dozen women ignore the man who
revolutionized basketball. He signs in (a sloppy signature to thwart
autograph dealers who plague him), lifts weights on 10 machines, and
pedals a Lifecycle exercise bike for 15 minutes at level 3. He has no
trouble chatting and pedaling at the same time.

With the body worked out, the mind starts churning.

''Eleven of 13 years, the Celtics won,'' says Cousy. ''That is the most
effective dynasty in history. No one has ever done that. People talk
about those Jordan-Pippen teams being the greatest dynasty. That's pure,
unadulterated b.s. We'd be competitive. We had a more dominant center
and a better point guard.''

The modern athlete doesn't have as much motivation, according to Cooz.

''We'd come back in September and saliva would be dripping from our
mouths,'' he says. ''The last 3-4 years, we played Los Angeles in the
playoffs, I'd stay in my room with the phone off the hook and eat all my
meals there thinking about the opponent. By the time I got to halfcourt
for the handshake, I wanted to kick him in the groin.

''Give me an untalented, self-motivated player against a superior player
and the motivated guy will just shove it up the tail of the better
player.

''Glenn Robinson signed for $69 million - that's enough for this
lifetime and whatever other Shirley MacLaine lifetimes to come. If he
stubs his toe, he still gets $69 million, whether he's been good, bad,
or indifferent.

''The difference is, we were year to year. My highest pay was $35,000 in
1963. Arnold [Auerbach] was into Pysch 101. Arnold knew who to threaten,
who to hold hands with. Arnold used to claim we were better-conditioned.
Hey, we were young and all in great shape. There was no organized
program. He used to just run our ass. We had 24 exhibition games, and he
was old-school. He only would play eight people. Today, forget the
trainer, get a psychiatrist.''

Cousy didn't lift weights when he was playing.

''We used to say we never saw a good muscle-bound shooter,'' he says.
''Now there's plenty of them. Now the Celtics do aerobics, stretching,
dance steps.

''Bill Sharman used to stretch and shoot around before games. Now they
all do. We'd all be making fun of him.''

Cousy, a 6-foot-1-inch guard who led the NBA in assists for eight
consecutive seasons and was Most Valuable Player in 1957, said teams
waste too much time looking at hours of film, and there is too much
blackboard X's and O's.

''I coached Tiny [Archibald] once,'' he says, ''and I told him, `If the
game is on the line and you are running upcourt and you see your coach
holding up fingers, just ignore him, 'cause Coach has lost his mind. You
need to create.'''

When Cousy retired from the Celtics in 1963, his playing weight was 188.
Now it is only 196.

''Literally, I eat only one real meal a day,'' he says. ''I never had
three meals. I can't relate to that. This morning I had a banana and a
bran bar. Lunch is maybe a cup of soup. And I have one big meal at
night. I have a glass of red wine or two at night, after my wife read my
[French] countrymen had a high-caloric diet and lived to be 90 thanks to
the properties of red wine. She feeds me a glass or two, and I fall
asleep on the couch.''

His wife, Marie, also feeds him multivitamins, fish oil, and fresh
vegetables she grows in their garden.

''After 52 years, she still wants me to be alive,'' he says.

According to Cousy, ''Life is 90 percent motivation.''

After his retirement, Cousy coached Boston College basketball for six
years, posting a 117-38 record. He remembers a game in which the Eagles
came into the locker room down by 18 at halftime. The normally
mild-mannered Cooz tossed a locker over and overturned a big vat of ice
water as his players sat in shock.

''Heading out, they took the doors off and made up those 18 points in
six minutes,'' says Cousy. ''We won, and Ed Hockenbury, the captain,
said, `Coach, that was great. Why don't you do that every time?' I said
`Eddie, you guys are going to put your poor coach in a grave.'''