BEHIND THE MICROPHONE

The Conundrum of Leadership

Sunday morning, I received word that University of Georgia linebacker Cornelius Washington had been arrested for DUI and speeding only hours after his team's 24-10 victory over Mississippi State.

I was thankful that that no one, including Mr. Washington, was injured by his actions.

Immediately, Washington was suspended for a minimum of two games.

Cornelius played a great game, recording two sacks for a Georgia defense that is coming on strong. The Bulldogs pass rush has been superb in recent weeks, and Washington has been a big reason why.

Now, his loss affects the team in a big way.

But his post-game poor judgement got me thinking about teamwork, and leadership, and the buy-in from all on the team.

I spent considerable time last weekend with Georgia players and coaches, and many mentioned the true team spirit that had galvanized their group from the inside.

Many pointed to leadership lessons gleaned from Jon Gordon's highly acclaimed book, "The Energy Bus", where Jon describes energy vampires and his famous No Complaining Rule.

What struck me then, and today, is how everyone was on board with this thinking and the positive impact it was making.

So what has me puzzled about Washington's poor decision was this: what is the leader supposed to do when he or she thinks everyone is On The Bus and someone strays?

And what is the tipping point for that person who momentarily gets Off The Bus?

Certainly, head coach Mark Richt has been down this road before. He acted swiftly, suspending the player, and making him apologize to the team. Washington will be missed.

As for the person  involved, what causes someone to forget about the lessons learned, and begin a chain reaction that clearly will be detrimental to himself, his family, and his team?

It's an age old question to be sure. We all have an override button. It's called free will. What makes us push it from time to time? Ego? Arrogance? Alcohol? Philosophers have been wrestling with this one since the beginning of time. Trying to figure out human behavior is a centuries-old proposition.

As for the leader, how do you handle the blind-side hit? How will effect the rest of the team? The leader must press on, stick with what he or she thinks is right, and keep the team together.

It looks like this to me: if you say you are going to get on the bus, then stay on the bus. But if you don't want to get on, don't. If you want off the bus, tell someone first. Don't let the leader get a phone call at 2 in the morning from the Highway Patrol announcing your decision.

My Meeting with Coach Wooden

The date was November 11, 2002. The place, the Ritz-Carlton Hotel, Marina Del Rey, CA.

 

Then Atlanta Hawks GM Pete Babcock arranged a meeting for the team with Coach John Wooden.

 

The entire traveling party made its way to a small banquet room, and in came Coach Wooden. He sat with us for over an hour. He knew our coach, Hall of Famer Lenny Wilkins very well. (How incredible to have two men in the same room who were selected as Hall of Famers as both players AND coaches.) But for many of us, we were stangers.

 

That did not matter to Coach Wooden. He spoke to us like we were an extension of his UCLA teams, reviewing his Pyramid of Success. He stressed conditioning (physical, mental, moral), skill (do it quickly), and team spirit (be considerate of others on and off the court).

 

Coach spoke of how winning was a by product of all of those characteristics. He stressed how the game was OFF the ball, both offensively and defensively. I was taking notes as fast as I could write.

 

We were all mesmorized. At the end, coach Wooden took the time to autograph each person’s copy of his book, "Wooden. A Lifetime of Observations and Reflections On and Off the Court".

 

“For Bob. Best wishes John Wooden.”

 

An unforgettable moment in time that I will take with me forever.

What It Is All About

Thanks to TJ Hanson for the tip on this story!

Duke University Graduate Parker Goyer Dreams Big, Delivers

Thursday, Dec. 4th 2008 8:24

All great journeys start with a dream - Osborn Earl “Ozzie” Smith.

It is likely that at every high school or college graduation ceremony, at some point in time, at least one of the speakers will insist that the secret to a life of fulfillment is to remain true to one’s dreams.

Yet, at the same time, it is also likely that a look towards the audience would reveal at least one adult with a cynical eye dismissing such blatant optimism in a most scornful manner.

Fortunately, however, there are still some students who not only listen to the speaker’s message of hope, they take it upon themselves to test the theory.

The Desire to Make a Difference
When asked about her involvement in Division I athletics at a high-profile school, Parker Goyer could point to many key lessons from the world of sports: persistence, work ethic, setting goals, and overcoming setbacks. She also could point to the year-round commitment necessary to compete at such a high level and the subsequent time constraints that participation had on her ability to utilize these important skills while being of service to others.

But the year-round commitment to school and to athletics left Goyer little opportunity to travel abroad or to partake in community service. For the 2007 graduate of Duke University, the latter was a big issue.

Inspired by the likes of Wendy Kopp, the founder and CEO of Teach for America and Greg Mortenson, a one-time mountain climber who has dedicated his life to building schools in remote parts of Pakistan and Afghanistan, Goyer chafed at the lack of opportunities student-athletes had to be of service to others.

Recognizing that there had to be other collegians with similar sentiments, Goyer came up with a bold plan, one that would allow student-athletes to utilize their skills and talents to help serve young people in countries less-developed than her own.

Coach for College
Now in her first year at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, Goyer conceived of the “Coach for College” program while visiting Vietnam and Belize the summer following her graduation. While visiting those countries, Goyer saw first hand an underdeveloped educational system and countless young people who simply did not have a cadre of role models to help lead them.

The former Duke tennis player saw an opportunity, a true win-win in the proverbial sense. If she could create a program that would allow American student athletes to put their athletic lessons to work in real life settings, the youngsters in some of the world’s poorer countries would not only have access to some key role models, those youngsters would have the chance to learn some valuable skills as well.

“A major guiding principle of the Coach for College program is that student-athletes have great traits they develop through sports,” explains Goyer. “But they don’t always apply these traits which they perfect on the playing field in other settings.”

“I wanted American student-athletes to realize that, by virtue of being highly-skilled sports players in some of the best higher education institutions in the world, they have tremendous power to make a difference.”

Program Launched in Summer of 2008
With a goal of utilizing sports to teach key life lessons, Goyer envisioned a group of college athletes giving up some of their summer time to help the youngsters in underdeveloped countries learn “critical thinking skills” and promote “excitement about academics.” While the need for funds was significant and the task of raising half-a-million dollars a daunting one, the 23-year-old never doubted the worthiness of her concept.

“A lot of people were skeptical at first and thought that I was too young, that this was too big of an idea, and didn’t know if I could pull it off,” reveals Goyer. “I think I was able to succeed by setting concrete goals, identifying key supporters early on, and using their advice and support to make steady progress towards my goals, one step at a time.”

Adding to her belief in the program concept itself, the idea of teaching life lessons through the world of sports, Goyer found herself drawing on the lessons she had taken from being a competitive athlete.

“Setting up the Coach for College program reinforced the value of sports in transmitting key life skills. I found myself drawing upon some of the same skills – persistence, work ethic, setting goals, overcoming setbacks, etc. — that I had used to make progress as a tennis player.”

Putting her organizational, goal-setting and perseverance skills to the test, Goyer secured more than $480,000 to fund the first two years of her concept. The monies came from two Atlantic Coast Conference rival colleges, Duke and the University of North Carolina, as well as the National Collegiate Athletics Association, the U.S. State Department, and a number of other individual and corporate donors.

With funding secured, this past summer student-athletes from both Duke and UNC made their way to rural Vietnam for the first ever “Coach for College” sessions. In addition, bilingual students from Can Tho University also led the training that involved the games of badminton, basketball, soccer, tennis, and volleyball.

A key component of the program included the building of a five-in-one sports court, with lines for the sports that would be taught in the program. Constructed on the grounds of the middle school, local workers built it using money from the funds Goyer had raised. The permanent construction meant that the Vietnamese children could continue, during their school year, to play the sports they had been introduced to by the Coach for College program that summer.

Working alongside their Vietnamese counterparts, the American student-athletes conducted two three-week units featuring a number of sports clinics and classroom lessons to 200 children ages 11-15. The group also managed to blend in Vietnamese high school students who benefited from the program but in turn served as next step role models for the younger children.

The basic lessons taught within the sports clinics were reinforced by academic offerings that featured the application of sports to Health/Biology, Physics, English, Leadership, and Education/Psychology. The program, free to interested children, provided a wealth of prizes/gifts based upon outcomes in team-based sports and academic competitions as well as each student’s completion of the various academic modules.

The Translatable Goals of Athletics
Wise beyond her years, Goyer created a program that offered lessons for both groups, the American students who accompanied her and the youngsters in Vietnam that participated in the clinics. Both groups saw first hand that teamwork, sacrifice, hard work, and determination often form the basis for success in many other settings.

“The overarching idea is that skills like perseverance, determination, setting and achieving goals, and overcoming setbacks, all of which can be learned through sports, are the keys to success in education as well,” notes Goyer. But as for the lessons for her fellow athletes, the Coach for College founder was unequivocal as to what came first for her.

“Personally, my primary goal is to help the middle school youth, and I intended the benefits to the coaches, both the American student-athletes and Vietnamese college students, to come as a natural by-product of their participation in the program.”

Still, Goyer attempted to work on the highest plane imaginable. More than simply providing Vietnamese youngsters with a cadre of role models, Goyer sought to inspire these 11-15-year-olds to consider higher education. To further that notion, the Coach for College concluded every daily camp session with a 30 minute class on the topic.

Following One’s Dream
Perhaps most importantly, the goal-setting Duke graduate has established other possible plateaus for her concept. Her vision is to see the program “partner with professional athletes” as well as “sports-related companies such as Nike.”

In addition, Goyer is set to invite other “universities which are athletic rivals to sponsor Coach for College programs at new sites.” The plan includes “utilizing the existing conference structure present in intercollegiate athletics” with the idea that each conference could perhaps sponsor a program in one particular region of the globe.

Once upon a time, Division I student-athletes may have had little to no chance to travel abroad or engage in meaningful service to others. But thanks to one young woman with a vision and a thorough understanding of the lessons that athletics can offer, student-athletes with a service mind set now have a concrete model to follow.

Editors Note: On Saturday, November 22nd, Parker Goyer was one of 32 Americans selected for a Rhodes Scholarship. Valued at $50,000 per year of study, the scholarship will enable the Coach for College (CfC) founder to study comparative international education at Oxford. Her hope is to learn more about the different education systems, academic curricula, and personnel of different countries to determine which ones will provide the best fit for the CfC program moving forward.

One Long Day

The Hawks are back home this week after a grueling five-game, Western Conference swing.
How grueling?
Here’s how the Hawks spent last Friday and Saturday:
10:30pm PT: After a thrilling win against the Golden State Warriors, the Hawks begin loading the busses for the short trip to the Oakland airport, and their awaiting flight to Salt Lake City for Saturday’s game with the Utah Jazz. Halfway thru the TSA screening at Oracle Arena, the traveling party learns it is spending the night in San Francisco, as the aircraft the Hawks are using is unable to land in Utah because of weather problems.
12:00am PT: The Hawks make it back to their hotel in San Francisco and check back in.
“8:15 BUS!” we are told.

Saturday, 7:30am. The players and staff, bleary eyed, start lugging a week’s worth of luggage back out of the hotel to the busses.
8:15am. We leave San Francisco for the Oakland Airport.
9:30am PT We depart. “How long is the flight?” “An Hour 20”. That’s good news. Oops. Forgot that we lose an hour going to the Mountain Time Zone.
12:00Noon MT. On the ground, safely, in Salt Lake. As we are ready to pull away from the plane, the first bus dies. That’s the one with the players and coaches.
Here comes Mike Woodson. “DOUBLE UP!” he bellows, so now we must make room for another 25 people and their belongings.
12:30pm MT We finally leave the airport for the hotel, less than seven hours before tipoff.
Mid-afternoon MT: The players and coaches head to a breakfast meeting to talk about tonight’s opponent, the Utah Jazz, winners of 13-straight home games and tied with Dallas for the best home record in the NBA.
5:00pm MT The first bus leaves for the arena. Followed by the second bus. The only problem is, the second bus is empty. It is not supposed to leave until 5:15. This comes as a surprise to those of us who are taking the second bus.
5:25pm MT The second bus returns, but cannot leave because Joe Johnson’s luggage cannot be located.
5:45pm MT Now all of the Hawks are at the arena, just 75 minutes prior to tip.
7:45pm MT Things are not going well for the visitors. Only 28 points on the board with 1:20 left before halftime.
7:50pm MT A dramatic change of fortune! Mike Bibby and Josh Smith combine for four three’s in the final 1:17 of the second quarter and the Hawks are back in the ball game!
9:45pm MT In the end, Utah just overpowers an Atlanta team that understandably ran out of gas. Except for Josh Smith and Mike Bibby. Smith goes for 30 and Bibby, playing on a severely bruised right heel, continues to show that, when healthy, he will be a huge addition to the Hawks.
11:15pm MT Back on the plane, headed to San Antonio. A long flight, and we lose another hour going to Central Time.
3:00am CT At the hotel in San Antonio, and ready to hit the sack. With the team dog tired, Woody has canceled practice for Sunday. Now the Hawks have a day to rest and recharge and prepare for the World Champion San Antonio Spurs.
The Hawks knew this was going to be a rough trip when the schedule came out. It proved to be all of that. Now the fight is on for the Eastern Conference playoffs. Philips Arena never looked so good.

Getting to the Point

You’re going to have to stay up late this week, but it will be worth it.

The Hawks embark on a five-game Western swing starting Tuesday night in LA against the Lakers.

That game will be your first opportunity to see Mike Bibby running the show for the Hawks.

Atlanta was able to secure the services of Bibby, not Cleveland, and the Hawks fortunes have taken a dramatic turn for the better.

The five-for-one swap, announced last weekend, shook up the Eastern playoff race. The Hawks hit the break having lost four in a row, including just an awful overtime loss in Charlotte.

Atlanta has dropped to seven games under .500, and had lost their enthusiasm for the game. There were a lot of long faces and dejected looks when the club disbanded for the all-star break.

But as the team reconvenes in Los Angeles Monday, there is a new spirit. One of hope that only a quality point guard could bring to this team at this time.

But let’s be clear about this---Bibby has to be given time to achieve quality results. This five-game Western trip would be daunting to the best teams in the league. And for Bibby, he’ll have only one practice with his new mates under his belt before the trip begins.

We also are not sure of the extent of the knee injury suffered by Josh Childress in the Detroit game last week. Chills was to be checked again early Monday morning before the team departed for the West Coast.

With a new roster, a new rotation must be worked out. Guys like Salim Stoudamire and Solomon Jones would probably find themselves playing new-found minutes. The team certainly cannot afford any injuries to the top seven.

But this much is clear: the Hawks are relevant again this season. They have a chance to recapture the positive buzz that surrounded the club after its big home wins in November and its great run of success in December.

As for Bibby, the Hawks are getting the proven point guard that the fans have been clamoring for, really, since Mookie Blalock left.

Just two seasons back, Mike averaged a career-high 21.1 PPG. He holds the Kings franchise record for consecutive free throws made (51) in the 02-03 season.

He is one of 61 players in NBA history to amass 10,000 points and 4,000 assists in a career.

Bibby was selected by Vancouver with the second overall pick in the 1998 NBA Draft. He went to the Kings in June of 2001 (with Brent Price for Jason Williams and Nick Anderson.)

Bibby is in a Hawks uniform. And the stakes have been raised accordingly. We have what we wanted Hawks fans: a legit point-guard, a real shot at the playoffs, and for the first time since Philips Arena opened the anticipation of meaningful games in March and April.

Hey, the Hawks are now must see TV!

Good, 'Ole Rocky Top

Looking for a dark horse to make this year’s Final Four? Look no further than Knoxville, TN.
Yes, Bruce Pearl’s Vols have what it takes to make it to San Antonio.
After last Saturday’s destruction of South Carolina in Columbia, Tennessee ran its winning streak to nine and improved to 14-1 heading into a Thursday date with Vanderbilt. The Vols will host Ohio State Saturday.
This is a club that has added two tremendous transfers. Tyler Smith, a Pulaski, TN native, was recruited by Buzz Peterson, but left when Buzz was let go. He went to Iowa, but transferred back to Tennessee and hooked up with the Vols after learning that his father was terminally ill. The NCAA granted Tyler a special exemption to play right away, and not sit out a year under the usual transfer rules.
Smith, 6-7, 215, is the best shooter among the starters. But he is much more than just a shooter. Tyler is a jack of all trades, leading the Vols in assists from the power forward position.
The other transfer of note is JP Prince, Tayshaun’s cousin. He became eligible in mid-December and entered the South Carolina game shooting 59.5 from the field! Prince started at Arizona.
JuJuan Smith, the 6-2 senor guard, is a pest. His ability to pressure opposing guard is tremendous, and he keys a ‘D’ that is second in the nation in steals per game.
Jordan Howell is the steady senior at the point, which leaves us with Chris Lofton.
Lofton, the heralded shooting guard, is having a terrible season. He is shooting 34% from the field and 33% from three-point range. His scoring continues to plummet, and now stands at 14 PPG for the season.
Lofton will still make a key bucket from time to time, but clearly, the Vols have figured out how to win without his productivity.
Lofton is seeing his pro stock drop with each game. He looks like a shadow of his former self, offensively.
Tennessee is the best I’ve seen in quite some time when pressuring the in-bounds pass. In their last 49 games, the Vols have forced teams to call 40 timeouts and commit 25 five-second violations.
Coach Pearl, in his third year, has turned the Big Orange into something special.

A big game for the Hawks Monday, when Atlanta hosts Portland. MLK Day is always a special event in Atlanta, and this year’s matinee offers a treat for Hawks fans to enjoy two of the great stories in the league so far this year. The Hawks are looking more and more like a playoff team as they flirt with .500, while the Blazers took the league by storm when they put together a 13-game winning streak. The Blazers are fighting with Denver and Utah for supremacy in the Northwest Division. (FSN South, 2PM).

All Great Leaders are Readers

OK, troops, how are those New Year’s Resolutions coming?
Well, all righty then! Let’s hit that re-start button!
One of the great people in sports and education is Dr. Paul Schempp from UGA’s Sports Instruction Research Laboratory.
Paul was kind enough to send along his study of readings recommended by expert coaches.
One distinguishing characteristic propelling experts to consistently superior performance is their extensive knowledge. One source often identified by experts as fundamental to their knowledge base is reading. Paul has done us the favor of asking coaches to identify the books that the great coaching leaders would recommend to beginning coaches.
I can think of no better way to get 2008 started than by going out and getting these books to start your own high performance library.
392 coaches from 29 different sports were sent letters explaining the study. 107 coaches from 17 sports responded. The participants recommended 156 authors and 177 book titles.
With Paul’s permission, here are the Top 5:

1. The Winner Within. Pat Riley, 1993. New York: Putnam’s Sons.
2. Wooden, A Lifetime of Observations and Reflections On and Off the Court. John Wooden and Steve Jamison, 1997. Lincolnwood, IL: Contemporary Books.
3. Search for the Perfect Swing, The Proven Scientific Approach to Fundamentally Improving Your Game. Alistair Cochran and John Stobbs. Chicago, IL: Triumph Books.
4. My Personal Best, Life Lessons from an All-American Journey. John Wooden and Steve Jamison, 2004. new York: McGraw-Hill.
5. Season of Life, A Football Star, A Boy, A Journey to Manhood. Jeffrey Marx. New York: Simon and Schuster.

Isn’t it interesting that three of the top five books are authored by basketball coaches? And Paul notes in his research that the authors most frequently identified were Wooden, Riley, and Dean Smith.
Marx, the Pulitzer Prize winning author, wrote A Football Star to chronicle the work of Joe Ehrmann, the former Baltimore Colt, and his teaching of life lessons through football at Gilman High School in Maryland.

Dr. Schempp will present these findings later this month in Japan at a Sport Science Conference. The entire reading list of 177 book titles would keep you going for years. Exceptional material.

My goal for 2008 is the same as 2007—a book a week, minimum of 52. I’ve got my first one done, working on number two. Paul has given us five must-reads!

The Homecoming

There is no question that Acie Law has turned the corner in his rookie season and now should be considered a skilled “vet”.

No, I’m not talking about his on-court play, although Law had his best game of the season in Dallas last Saturday. I’m referring to how Acie handled his homecoming.

Law did everything right in his return to his native Dallas last weekend. The former Texas A&M and Dallas Kimball guard had many family members and friends come to see him make his home debut as a member of the Hawks, but he didn't know how many.

"My mom took care of that," he said when asked how many tickets he had to get. "I didn't have anything to do with it."

Procuring tickets is a distraction for all players, but Law handled it expertly -- better, in fact, than he handled one trip through the lane. Law got whacked in the mouth and a tooth went through his lip. He was headed to the doctor's office after the game for stitches.

Law had a solid camp and first month, but has had a hard time adjusting to his comeback from a nasty ankle injury that caused him to miss 10 games. Remember, he missed only two of 122 games at A&M due to injury. So coming back from an injury is foreign to Mr. Law

"I can play a lot better," he said. "I've been up and down a little due to my injury, but I have no excuses. I need to pick it up."

Acie also invited over 150 students from his foundation to the game. The youngsters from Acie’s former elementary, middle, and high schools had to write an essay to get the free tickets.

Still, he said coming home was "a great feeling. "My friends and family get to see me live my dream," Law said. It will not be much longer before Hawks fans see Law living his new dream as a starting point guard in the NBA!

What to Think?

Wow, that was some week last week.
From Bobby Petrino to Roger Clemens, we’ll not soon forget the events of the last seven days.
And what to think of all that?
First, the Falcons.
One thing I have learned in a lifetime of covering college and professional sports is this—unless you are on the inside, and I mean the inner sanctum of these teams—you don’t know the whole story.
There is so much more to all of these stories that what you have heard and read is just the tip of the iceberg.
But with limited knowledge, the entire Petrino affair looks distasteful.
From the outside looking in, it is hard for me to believe that a coach would leave his team in the middle of the season. An NFL coach headed back to college should not have any trouble telling that new team to wait three weeks while he finishes his season.
And what about Arkansas? What kind of program wants a coach that would jump ship to captain yours?
(Let’s not get into the sanctity of the signed contract, shall we? How long was that deal you signed in Louisville, Bobby?)
Certainly, the Petrino Follies will be used against him in recruiting. I’ve heard it said that Petrino will have a hard time in the living rooms of potential recruits. Theory holds that Ma and Pa want Little Johnny to have his coach the whole way thru his college experience.
Well, that’s a nice fairy tale. But the truth is there are plenty of parents who just want Petrino to get their kid to the NFL as soon as possible so the paychecks can start rollin’.
Maybe they could start a conga line with the coach and in unison shout, “We’re Gonna Get Paid!”. They don’t much care how long Petrino lasts in Fayetteville just as long as Their Kid can make it to the league.

The Mitchell Report on steroids was another disturbing bit of news. Not so much for the names that were revealed but how there has been a seismic shift in the values of baseball players, never very high to begin with in the first place.
The history of the game is replete with players trying to gain an edge any way they can. From Slippery Elm to greenies, from sign-stealing to HGH, players will stop at nothing in their quest to beat the system.
But for me, the story of the Steroids Era is this: In years past, players (Pete Rose comes to mind) always held the standard of the Hall of Fame to be bench mark as the highest point in the game. Rose certainly feels this way, and his lifetime ban is keeping him from being in amongst the games greatest players. He never thought he would get caught. And if he did, he’d find a way out. After 13 years of denials on gambling before his admission of guilt, Pete still finds himself on the outside looking in. And looking back, I’m sure Pete feels that it was not worth doing what he did if it will keep him out of the Hall forever. That’s just a guess on my part, but knowing how Rose truly loves the game of baseball I can’t help but think he feels that way in his remorse.
Not so with today’s stars. To use Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens as examples, those players, when faced with a decision to use steroids, picked money over the Hall.
Money is now officially (not that there was much doubt) the most important thing in baseball. Money that the clubs generates. Money that the border-line player can make if he juices and can stay in the big leagues. And money (Bonds and Clemens have made tons) is more important than the Hall. If the allegations are true, then Bonds, Clemens and the like will be recognized as the first players that made the conscious decision to violate first, the laws of the USA and in so doing, thumb their noses at the baseball establishment by using, for profit, performance enhancing drugs.
The money won out. Sad to say, but when has it not? Unfortunately, the money is so big now for the players and the owners in major league baseball that for the first time in memory, the game has taken a back seat.
Get rich. Stay rich. And do what ever it takes to stay at the top. If it keeps me out of the HOF and convicts me in the court of public opinion, so be it.
It was worth it to be a cheat.
What a great message to send to our young people.

Atlanta's Rising Stars

Tomorrow night, the Hawks will face the Magic in Orlando. It will be Atlanta’s first look at the 16-5 Magic men, and will give us another installment of the Battle of Atlanta, Dwight Howard vs. John Smith.

Heading into the game, Josh had put together an outstanding run of five games. Starting with the New Orleans game on November 30th, J-Smoove was shooting .560 from the floor, and had not attempted a three-point shot in his last three games. Included in the run was a 28-point effort against Minnesota. The NBA’s league-leading shot blocker swatted seven against the T-Wolves. Josh has averaged 20.8 PPG over the stretch.

His former AAU teammate Dwight Howard continues to lead a Magic team that has been incredible on the road this season. (Mark your calendars now: Orlando will be at Philips much later in the season: Sat. March 22 and Tues. April 15).

Dwight’ presence inside has brought back memories of the franchise’s halcyon days when Shaquille O’Neal patrolled the middle.

This Magic team looks to have the most potential of any club that has followed in the wake of failure and frustration created by O’Neal’s exit in the summer of 1996.

The Magic have matched the record 20-game start recorded by the franchise’s two best teams—the 1994-95 and the ‘95-96 clubs of Shaq, Penny Hardaway, Nick Anderson and Dennis Scott.

Much like those teams, the Magic now have a big-time center, and have surrounded him with fantastic shooters.

“There is so much of a resemblance,” said Anderson, now a community ambassador for the Magic. “I really think this team could become like our team of ‘94-95. There are lots of similarities, starting with Dwight and Shaq. They’re not as big as we were, but the makeup is there.”

The scary things is  Howard is just 22 (same as Josh), and is signed through 2013.

I say bring back the old NBA territorial draft! Atlanta should have both Smith and Howard.

“The biggest comparison is that they have multiple weapons like we did,” Scott, the current Hawks radio analyst and former three-point bomber in Orlando, said.

“And people want to use the Shaq- and Dwight-as-anchors angle, and it works. I’m not sure they have a guy like Penny, but we didn’t a Rashard Lewis, either.

“This team just needs maybe one more guy who can come off the bench and win the game for you. They are close, but I’m not sure they are there yet.”

With the Hawks improving day-by-day, and Washington crippled with a key injury to Gilbert Arenas, it may not be very long until we are looking at a situation that the Hawks and the Magic will be the top two teams in the Southeast Division for the foreseeable future.