DePaul's Randolph Finds Life Harder

The New York Times Archives

By Malcolm MoranFeb. 19, 1983

See the article in its original context from

February 19, 1983, Section 1, Page 18

CHICAGO Life was so much less complicated when Bernard Randolph was younger, and the basketball team at DePaul University was built around the talents of his friends. He had come from Westinghouse High School in Chicago, the same public school that sent Mark Aguirre and Skip Dillard to DePaul.

Aguirre and Dillard are gone, and Terry Cummings gave up his final year of eligibility to play in the pros, and Teddy Grubbs is no longer playing basketball. Their replacements may possess strong individual instincts, but with the expansion of DePaul's recruiting area, this season's group of freshmen grew up on basketball courts from Florida to California, not the playgrounds of Chicago. And so at the age of 21, Bernard Randolph, once the clever young substitute and now the senior expected to help this new group grow together, sounds much older and more tired.

''I know there's been a great emotional stress on me,'' he said after a recent practice. ''There's a delicate situation being in your last year. You want to perform and play well. You want to win, and when it doesn't turn out that way, it's a heavy burden. Just to be a college athlete, it's deep.''

''Was it more fun then?'' he was asked. ''Well,'' Randolph said, ''we were winning.'' The Blue Demons, who had lost two games in each of Randolph's first three seasons, have a record of 14-8 going into the game against St. John's tomorrow afternoon at Madison Square Garden.

The expectations had finally decreased before this season, but the same young DePaul team that took U.C.L.A. to overtime in the third game of the season was not expected to lose to Gonzaga more than a month later. ''We've regressed an awful lot since the beginning of the season,'' said Ray Meyer, the head coach. Some of the maturity the Demons have lacked was expected to come from Randolph, the most experienced senior.

When Meyer was asked if Randolph has provided any leadership, he shook his head. ''Because he doesn't play hard all the time,'' Meyer said. ''He has habits of coasting. When he coasts, he's not a good ballplayer.''

Meyer has become frustrated because he has seen Randolph rebound and work hard on defense and move without the ball. He has just not seen those things often enough. ''I don't know what's in his head,'' Meyer said. ''He'll play in the big games. He'll feel there's a lot of attention. Funny kid. He gets in a mood when he doesn't put out. He just goes through the motions. When he wants to, he does a job. When he wants to do it. ... He had this syndrome, that if you score the pros will like you. But they look at the whole game. He's got to play both ends of the court.''

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Randolph said he has been frustrated. He sees himself as part of a team that is building for a time when he will no longer be around. He has also faced the strain of coping with trick defenses for the first time. Once, when Aguirre or Cummings received most of an opponent's attention, Randolph was often the overlooked DePaul player who was able to score points that were easy and spectacular. ''Whatever I did was extra,'' he said. Now that his scoring is badly needed, the points have become more difficult.

As Randolph was able to accomplish less and less, he reached the breaking point on the night of Jan. 12. Two nights before, DePaul had lost to Gonzaga, and now it was losing to Loyola, and although the game was on the road, the team that had been Chicago's best hope for a championship was hearing boos from its own fans.

There are several ways for a player to react when the expectations of a city and the demands of the coach are not satisfied. Aguirre seemed to let the criticism roll off his back. Grubbs, once a quiet high school all-American, withdrew even more, developed personal problems, and eventually left the team.

R andolph erupted. On the bench during the Loyola game, Randolph said that Meyer was old, and he said a lot worse, according to sources in the DePaul athletic department. Meyer did not hear the outburst, but when he was told about it Randolph was suspended for one game.

Randolph, back in the role of the sixth man, made 55 percent of his shots after his return to the lineup Jan. 21. Then last Monday he made only three of 11 shots in the double-overtime loss to Ohio University. His foul shooting helped beat Evansville, and his jump shot late in the game gave the Demons a lead over Alabama-Birmingham. For the season, he is averaging 14.6 points per game, a shade lower than last year.

But at the point of a season when struggling teams still have time to improve and become the surprise of the N.C.A.A. tournament, Randolph does not seem to be having very much fun. ''I've just come with the attitude that I'm going to work hard and play as hard as I can,'' he said. ''I don't have but a couple of games left in college.''

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A version of this article appears in print on Feb. 19, 1983, Section 1, Page 18 of the National edition with the headline: PLAYERS; DePaul's Randolph Finds Life Harder.