Hansen's Sunday Notebook: Kerr a single-name sensation in new role

BERKELEY, Calif.

On a long drive through rush-hour traffic Friday, I was listening to San Francisco’s sports radio giant KNBR. The guest was football Hall of Famer Ronnie Lott, who was ostensibly on air to chat about the Super Bowl and the deflated footballs scandal.

Instead, after a brief preamble about football, Lott talked only about the Golden State Warriors. He talked about “Steve.”

Not once in the nine-minute conversation did the KNBR host or Lott say “Steve Kerr.” Just Steve.

This has become the City of Steve.

A day before Reggie Jackson and Lute Olson showed up at Oracle Arena to watch Klay Thompson score 52 points against Sacramento, Kerr received one of the best compliments of his basketball career.

“This is the best group of people I have ever been around,” said Jerry West, a Golden State executive board member. “And that’s saying a lot.”

West has been in the NBA since 1960. Kerr and his culture, which includes ex-UA players Luke Walton, Bruce Fraser and Andre Iguodala, has impressed West mightily.

The Warriors have discovered what Tucsonans first learned in 1984: Kerr attracts good people and good people are attracted to Kerr.

Earlier in the week, ESPN’s Hannah Storm, wife of Sabino High grad Dan Hicks — a Kerr UA contemporary in the 1980s – showed up at Oracle Arena to film a free-throw shooting “contest” between Kerr and Warriors All-Star Stephen Curry.

It was hilarious. It was the self-deprecating Kerr at his best.

Kerr shot 86.4 percent from the foul line in his NBA days; Curry is shooting 89.8 percent in six years in the league. You could see that the bond and respect between the two is unbreakable.

After Thompson scored 52 points on Friday, Kerr abbreviated his post-game press session to 4 minutes 45 seconds. He said Thompson, not the coach, deserved the spotlight. And, typically, Kerr said that Thompson’s career night had nothing to do with the coach’s strategy.

“We had two plays,” said Kerr, “get the ball to Klay, and Klay, get the ball.”

The Warriors are an NBA-best 35-6 and it’s not because Kerr is unflappable or because he leads the league in fun. He knows when to be serious.

Incredibly, Kerr is tied for the lead among NBA coaches with six technical fouls.

He not only has a touch, he has a bite, too.

In figures sent to the Tucson Greens Committee last week, the five city golf courses operated at a $494,410 loss for the first six months of the fiscal year.

Food and beverage alone was $241,313 under projected revenues. The base golf operation (mostly from playing fees) earned $2.1 million; management projected a $2.7 million income.

But this isn’t a problem unique to the five city golf courses. Two upscale courses, Vistoso Golf Course and Arizona National, recently went broke after the IRI Group’s implosion and eliminated privileges of those who had paid in advance, including some “lifetime memberships.”

After years of financial woes, Oro Valley Country Club, one of the area’s most successful golf operations of the last 50 years, was recently acquired by Club Corp of America, a Dallas-based firm that is taking over OVCC operations.

Tucson’s five muni golf courses are a resource for local golfers matched by few in the United States. In the year since OB Sports has taken over day-to-day management of those courses, it has created a sense of competence.

It is Step 1 in what could be a fruitful process depending on the patience of Tucson’s political heavyweights.

Tucsonan George Cunningham qualified in the No. 1 spot for Arizona’s home debut of the 2015 golf season. The Wildcats will play host to 14 teams at the Arizona Intercollegiate Monday and Tuesday at the Sewailo Golf Club, 5655 West Valencia Road. Ironwood Ridge grad Alex McMahon qualified No. 2 for the Wildcats. The field includes Pac-12 contenders ASU and Cal. ASU’s Jon Rahm, the No. 3-ranked player in the World Amateur poll, is on the list to play, but he also received an exemption to play in the Phoenix Open later in the week. 

The Tucson Conquistadores Classic continued to score last week with top golfers for its March 20-22 Champions Tour event at Tucson National. Tom Lehman, Jay Haas and Jesper Parnevik are the latest to commit, joining Bernhard Langer and Colin Montgomerie, among others. It’s encouraging to see Tom Watson in the first Champions Tour event of the season, ongoing in Hawaii. It’s a sign he is likely to join the Tucson field. 

Three-time Tucson Open champ Phil Mickelson has opted out of two of his regular PGA Tour West Coast swing events, the Northern Trust Open in Los Angeles and the AT&T Pebble Beach Open. Why? “My kids are on vacation,” he said. At least Mickelson is consistent; that was his reason for not playing in the final two Match Play events at Dove Mountain. 

If you eliminate Mickelson and Tiger Woods from this week’s Waste Management Phoenix Open, it’s basically the Quad Cities Open. The overall field is ordinary, with no European presence. Tucsonan Michael Thompson will make his 2015 PGA Tour debut in Phoenix. 

On the day UA point guard T.J. McConnell made 8 of 10 shots to beat Utah, his younger brother, Matty McConnell, scored 54 points and grabbed 24 rebounds as his team, Chartiers Valley (Pa.), beat rival Bethel Park. Matty, bound for Robert Morris, might’ve scored 60, but he was taken out with 4:00 remaining.

One thing Sean Miller monitors daily is the mental health of those who sit on Arizona’s bench. He has been at it so long that he knows when a player “checks out.” That’s why he found it so rewarding when senior Matt Korcheck came off the bench at Stanford to score four points and grab two rebounds Thursday night. Korcheck checked in, not out. “He’s one of our hardest workers, one of the most consistent people and good teammates we have,” said Miller. “You have to admire how consistent he is every day.” In addition to waiting for his shot, Korcheck, who played at Sabino High and Cochise College, is two classes away from earning his degree. “One of the big reasons Matt came here is to be part of a winning program, and the Stanford game was a defining moment for him,” said Miller. “His family and his previous coaches prepared him for life after basketball. He doesn’t expect anything to be given to him.” 

Todd Walsh, a former Tucson sports-radio personality and one of Lute Olson’s first basketball managers at Arizona, has gone on to a rewarding career for Fox Sports Arizona, working as an analyst for Diamondbacks and Coyotes broadcasts. He will have a career moment on Feb. 21 when he has been asked to emcee a reunion of the 1980 “Miracle on Ice” Olympic gold medal hockey team. Walsh will be in Lake Placid, New York, for the special day. 

The Toronto Raptors will honor UA assistant basketball coach Damon Stoudamire at one of their seven games celebrating their 20th anniversary this season. Stoudamire was the Raptors’ leading scorer in 1995-96, their first season, averaging 19.0 points and becoming the NBA Rookie of the Year. The only difficulty is whether Stoudamire can get to Toronto during the UA’s busy basketball season. 

Pueblo High grad Michael Perez is shooting just 24.2 percent on three-point shots during his senior year at Nevada. He shot .331 last year, but injured his right wrist and is limited. He shot 0 for 5 afield against Utah State last week, but remains in the Wolf Pack’s starting lineup because of his defensive ability. He is averaging just 8.1 points, down from 11.5 as a junior. 

The top recruiting news of the week on the UA campus was that Caroline Cordes, sister of Arizona’s NCAA men’s swimmer of the year Kevin Cordes, has committed to play for Arizona’s sand volleyball team. Caroline Cordes, of Naperville, Illinois, is considered one of the leading sand volleyball prospects in the Midwest.

One of the surprises of last week’s NCAA convention was that the UA’s 20 student-athlete representatives, one for each sport, voted 18-2 against guaranteeing scholarships for four years. (The NCAA approved that measure.) It reflects on UA coaches. It means they have been fair in dealing with athletes, not chasing them off campus and making them feel disposable year to year. Athletic director Greg Byrne was accompanied at the Washington, D.C., convention by Wildcat softball player Chelsea Suitos, who was one of 80 invited student-athletes. Suitos, who started 49 games for Arizona last season, has been an exemplary student as well as a .300-hitting ballplayer. She has a double-major in family studies and human development and also worked as a Nike intern over the summer. 

At the Edward Jones Southern Arizona Senior Short-Course Open last week at Rolling Hills Golf Course, Tucsonan Richard Bourgette was the overall men’s winner, shooting a two-day total of 135. Sue McKnight was the women’s champion in the inaugural event. The men’s field attracted a capacity of 75 players. Not bad for a little ol’ “executive course.” 

Catalina Foothills grad Austin Nehls, the Star’s 2014 high school boys basketball Player of the Year, scored 27 points at TD Garden in Boston last week, playing for Cheshire Academy of Connecticut. “It’s a memory that will last a lifetime,” said his father, Joe Nehls, an All-Pac-10 shooting guard at UA in 1980. 

After playing seven seasons and 353 NBA games, former UA guard Will Bynum signed to play with the Guangdong Southern Tigers of the Chinese pro league this year. The Tigers are 19-0 in Bynum’s stay; he is averaging 22.8 points. It should prompt an NBA team to give Bynum, 32, another shot. 

As for the deflated football “scandal,” when I was the basketball manager at Utah State, in the early 1970s, we traveled with our own needle, to inflate and deflate balls to suit our point guard. It has forever been a common (but unspoken) part of college basketball, including the Olson years at Arizona and at virtually every Pac-12 program. No harm, no foul.

The Super Bowl and the PGA Tour are no one’s idea of games for the masses.

Parking for next week’s Super Bowl at University of Phoenix Stadium will cost between $100 to $150 in stadium lots. You can park for $50 as far away as Kellis High School (2 miles away), but there is no shuttle bus system.

If you want to sit at the famed 16th hole and kick off your golf shoes at the Waste Management Phoenix Open, you have to be part of a skybox group. Each skybox sells for $45,000 for the week. They are sold out.

The best sports deal of the week? For pocket change, you can watch Monday night’s Catalina Foothills at Sahuaro girls soccer game. Both are state title contenders: The Falcons are 10-1-2, while the Cougars check in at 14-4-2. It will also be one of your last chances to see ASU-bound Sahuaro standout Allison Raniere, who has already scored an unthinkable 31 goals this year.

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