Jim Valvano

He would rather fight than swishValvano's new goal is defeating cancerThere was Jim Valvano, the up-and-coming coach, ascending the college basketball ladder from Johns Hopkins to North Carolina State, filling notebooks at each rung with wisecracks. There was Jim Valvano, the underdog champion, dancing across the court when N.C. State upset Houston. There was Jim Valvano, the disgraced coach, a fall guy for the ills of yet another big-time basketball program. And there was Jim Valvano, television personality, a surprisingly good analyst, the thinking-man's Dick Vitale.

Days Cove Teens to take part in Envirothon County teens will participate Wednesday in the 2008 Canon Envirothon, a natural resources competition for high school students, in the Days Cove area of Gunpowder Falls State Park. Students have been studying about the state's natural resources and environmental issues in preparation for the outdoor competition. The highest-scoring county team advances to the state competition in June. Information: 410-666-1188, ext. 3. Reisterstown Faculties schedule basketball fundraiser The faculties of Franklin Middle and Franklin High schools in Reisterstown will hold their third annual "Two Schools, One Cause" Battle for the Bell Charity Basketball Game at 6 p.m. Thursday at the Franklin High gym, 12000 Reisterstown Road.

NEW YORK -- Jim Valvano is battling a virulent form of cancer called metastatic adrenal carcinoma and it has apparently spread along his back, according to his brother, Bobby Valvano.Valvano, the former basketball coach at North Carolina State turned broadcaster, is living with relatives in New York City while he receives out-patient chemotherapy at Manhattan's Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center.Valvano's doctors have told him and his family just what he is dealing with. "Metastasize means that it has advanced, it has spread," said Bobby Valvano.

Tragic events involving sports figures last week:` SATURDAY, APRIL 24* Eighteen members of the Zambian national soccer team and five team officials are among 30 people killed when a military plane crashes off Gabon.* Anthony Francis Tornetta, owner of Wood Memorial winner and Kentucky Derby-bound Storm Tower, dies at age 63 after a long battle with lung cancer.# WEDNESDAY, APRIL 28* Jim Valvano, who coached North Carolina State's men's basketball team to an improbable national championship in 1983 and also gained acclaim as a television analyst, dies at age 47 after a 10-month battle with cancer.

According to the New York Daily News, Jim Valvano, who exited N.C. State under fire, and now does double-duty with ABC and ESPN, is already getting antsy and will leave TV if he connects with a college or NBA gig.Valvano admits he already misses running his own team. "The high of broadcasting a good game is not the same as winning when you are coaching," Valvano said. "I miss the locker room. I do the same preparation [for TV] as I did as a coach but now it's not my team."I miss giving the Knute Rockne pep talk, I miss getting those pre-game nerves and I really miss the one-on-one; you know, my team against your team.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Former North Carolina State basketball coach Jim Valvano has cancer in his back.Valvano, now a television analyst with ABC and ESPN, has not felt well for more than a month and has been undergoing tests in Raleigh, his agent, Art Kaminsky, said.Kaminsky said that Valvano was given the diagnosis this week but that the extent of the illness had not been determined."It's serious, I won't deny that, but there are many details we don't know yet," Kaminsky said.Valvano, 46, who was unavailable for comment, will have tests in Raleigh today and will go to the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York next week for extensive testing.

* Jim Valvano: In the midst of point-shaving and payoff allegations, North Carolina State ended its 10-year association with basketball coach Jim Valvano by buying out his contract for $212,000 April 7. On June 4, ABC-TV, whose news reports led to Valvano's ouster, hired the coach as a broadcast analyst for $900,000.* John McEnroe: The tortured artist of men's tennis became the first player in the 85-year history of the Australian Open to get tossed from the tournament for a tirade that led to $6,500 in fines.

Days Cove Teens to take part in Envirothon County teens will participate Wednesday in the 2008 Canon Envirothon, a natural resources competition for high school students, in the Days Cove area of Gunpowder Falls State Park. Students have been studying about the state's natural resources and environmental issues in preparation for the outdoor competition. The highest-scoring county team advances to the state competition in June. Information: 410-666-1188, ext. 3. Reisterstown Faculties schedule basketball fundraiser The faculties of Franklin Middle and Franklin High schools in Reisterstown will hold their third annual "Two Schools, One Cause" Battle for the Bell Charity Basketball Game at 6 p.m. Thursday at the Franklin High gym, 12000 Reisterstown Road.

Tragic events involving sports figures last week:` SATURDAY, APRIL 24* Eighteen members of the Zambian national soccer team and five team officials are among 30 people killed when a military plane crashes off Gabon.* Anthony Francis Tornetta, owner of Wood Memorial winner and Kentucky Derby-bound Storm Tower, dies at age 63 after a long battle with lung cancer.# WEDNESDAY, APRIL 28* Jim Valvano, who coached North Carolina State's men's basketball team to an improbable national championship in 1983 and also gained acclaim as a television analyst, dies at age 47 after a 10-month battle with cancer.

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. -- On a recruiting trip to North Carolina last Monday, Florida State basketball coach Pat Kennedy had dinner with Jim Valvano, for whom he was an assistant at Iona many years ago.Valvano won an NCAA championship at N.C. State before becoming a television analyst. He told Kennedy, whose Seminoles are newcomers to the Atlantic Coast Conference, he would be measured in his new conference by a variety of things but none more important than how he does against Dean Smith. And then Valvano gave his old assistant some pointers on how to deal with Smith and his undefeated, No. 5 North Carolina Tar Heels.

Perhaps the best investment this weekend is not the stock market, mutual funds, an IRA or a CD, but the old office pool for the Kentucky Derby tomorrow."

Florida State basketball coach Pat Kennedy said recently of ** his mentor and former boss Jim Valvano: "We always thought Jimmy had nine lives, but I guess he only has one like the rest of us."That life ended yesterday when Valvano, 47, lost a 10-month battle with cancer."He put up a good fight. It's amazing what a constitution he had," said Atlantic Coast Conference commissioner Gene Corrigan. "I don't know how many of us could have done what he did."Valvano's death came a little more than 10 years after he vaulted onto the national stage by leading North Carolina State to an NCAA championship with a huge upset of Houston.

He would rather fight than swishValvano's new goal is defeating cancerThere was Jim Valvano, the up-and-coming coach, ascending the college basketball ladder from Johns Hopkins to North Carolina State, filling notebooks at each rung with wisecracks. There was Jim Valvano, the underdog champion, dancing across the court when N.C. State upset Houston. There was Jim Valvano, the disgraced coach, a fall guy for the ills of yet another big-time basketball program. And there was Jim Valvano, television personality, a surprisingly good analyst, the thinking-man's Dick Vitale.

NEW YORK -- Jim Valvano is battling a virulent form of cancer called metastatic adrenal carcinoma and it has apparently spread along his back, according to his brother, Bobby Valvano.Valvano, the former basketball coach at North Carolina State turned broadcaster, is living with relatives in New York City while he receives out-patient chemotherapy at Manhattan's Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center.Valvano's doctors have told him and his family just what he is dealing with. "Metastasize means that it has advanced, it has spread," said Bobby Valvano.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Former North Carolina State basketball coach Jim Valvano has cancer in his back.Valvano, now a television analyst with ABC and ESPN, has not felt well for more than a month and has been undergoing tests in Raleigh, his agent, Art Kaminsky, said.Kaminsky said that Valvano was given the diagnosis this week but that the extent of the illness had not been determined."It's serious, I won't deny that, but there are many details we don't know yet," Kaminsky said.Valvano, 46, who was unavailable for comment, will have tests in Raleigh today and will go to the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York next week for extensive testing.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Former North Carolina State basketball coach Jim Valvano has been diagnosed as having cancer in his back.Valvano, now a television analyst with ABC and ESPN, has not felt well for more than a month and has been undergoing tests in Raleigh, said his agent, Art Kaminsky.Kaminsky said that Valvano was given the diagnosis this week but that the extent of the illness had not been determined."It's serious, I won't deny that, but there are many details we don't know yet," Kaminsky said.

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. -- On a recruiting trip to North Carolina last Monday, Florida State basketball coach Pat Kennedy had dinner with Jim Valvano, for whom he was an assistant at Iona many years ago.Valvano won an NCAA championship at N.C. State before becoming a television analyst. He told Kennedy, whose Seminoles are newcomers to the Atlantic Coast Conference, he would be measured in his new conference by a variety of things but none more important than how he does against Dean Smith. And then Valvano gave his old assistant some pointers on how to deal with Smith and his undefeated, No. 5 North Carolina Tar Heels.

BIG MAN ON CAMPUS:JOHN THOMPSON ANDTHE GEORGETOWN HOYAS.Leonard Shapiro.Henry Holt.310 pages. $19.95.VALVANO: THEY GAVE MEA LIFETIME CONTRACT,AND THEN THEYDECLARED ME DEAD.Jim Valvanoand Curry Kirkpatrick.Pocket Books.259 pages. $19.95. Reading in tandem "Big Man on Campus," the biography of Georgetown basketball coach John Thompson, and "Valvano," former North Carolina State coach Jim Valvano's rise-and-fall story, is telltale: In big-time college basketball, image is the sixth man.Leonard Shapiro, a Washington Post sportswriter who has known Mr. Thompson for 20 years, attributes the coach's success to "bogarding" -- affecting a Humphrey Bogart "tough-guy, take-no-stuff-from-no-one" demeanor.

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. -- On a recruiting trip to North Carolina last Monday, Florida State basketball coach Pat Kennedy had dinner with Jim Valvano, for whom he was an assistant at Iona many years ago.Valvano won an NCAA championship at N.C. State before becoming a television analyst. He told Kennedy, whose Seminoles are newcomers to the Atlantic Coast Conference, he would be measured in his new conference by a variety of things but none more important than how he does against Dean Smith. And then Valvano gave his old assistant some pointers on how to deal with Smith and his undefeated, No. 5 North Carolina Tar Heels.

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. -- On a recruiting trip to North Carolina last Monday, Florida State basketball coach Pat Kennedy had dinner with Jim Valvano, for whom he was an assistant at Iona many years ago.Valvano won an NCAA championship at N.C. State before becoming a television analyst. He told Kennedy, whose Seminoles are newcomers to the Atlantic Coast Conference, he would be measured in his new conference by a variety of things but none more important than how he does against Dean Smith. And then Valvano gave his old assistant some pointers on how to deal with Smith and his undefeated, No. 5 North Carolina Tar Heels.