KEITH GROLLER'S FRIDAY BASKETBALL RECAP

It's the wee hours of Friday night (actually Saturday morning) and just a quick recap of my day which was quite busy.

Started out at Allen and I have to say I was most impressed with Cedric Lloyd, the new Allen High football coach.

As I wrote in the newspaper, this is a very confident, very charismatic, very dynamic person that certainly has a presence about him when he speaks. I can see why the Allentown School District looked at the person, and not necessarily the record, when they tabbed Lloyd. And Llolyd said that the record was not as bad as it seems considering the obstacles he faced in Indianapolis.

I don't know if he'll be successful. And at Allen and Dieruff, success in football is measured in different ways than it is at a Liberty, Easton or Parkland. I don't know about his X's and O's and his ability to judge talent and to put people in the right position. That's all to be determined.

But I do believe without any doubt that he'll create some excitement and enthusiasm and have the kids believing they can turn it around, and that's half the battle.

He is a great interview and can be heard on our "Calling All Sports" radio show at 9:30 this morning. The show is on 1470 AM and also can be heard online at www.fox1470.com

I have a lot of stuff from Lloyd that we can write about later and he was also a coach at another Indianapolis school for three years and had much more success than he did at Manual, which was his last stop.

But what I do like is that he said "Change is coming and you better get a ticket. There will be no free rides."

He's going to instill discipline, a sense of knowing right from wrong, and he talks in terms of a program and a community and not just a team.

I might be old school, but I really like the fact that he's going to insist the kids dress up and wear ties on game day. That's something I like in college and pro teams. When a bus pulls up and you see athletes hopping off in coats and tie, it gets your attention. It says "We're somebody special." I like that approach.

I am not saying they should start clearing trophy case space at Allen, but it's nice to see some enthusiasm with Allen football again. AD Scott Cooperman compared Lloyd's oratory and motivational skills to Rich Sniscak and Sniscak did take Allen to the 1992 District 11 title.

Along the same lines, I bumped into former Allen and Villanova star Eugene Clay and he, too, believes things are changing for the better. He will be part of Lloyd's staff. He can't wait to get started on next season.

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Then I spent a lot of time at Whitehall tonight for the Hall of Fame ceremony and the game between Central Catholic and the Zephyrs. The whole ceremony was well done by AD Bob Hartman and all of the candidates spoke so eloquently.

But because I covered them, I was especially pleased and proud to see softballer Gina (Lindenmuth) Miller, Dan Koppen and Pete Lisicky inducted.

All three not only made their mark as terrific athletes, but you can tell that they're all also outstanding people who are doing great things in their lives -- and not just on NFL Sundays for Koppen.

Lisicky, though, was amazing in acknowledging family members by speaking in Italian, Slovakian and in Pennsylvania Dutch. Very, very impressive.

The standing ovations these individuals received were all so well deserved and you could sense that they were genuinely touched by the honor and the emotion of being back at their alma mater.

I didn't know the older gentlemen -- Tom Lukish and Jeff Gerhard -- and don't intend to slight them. They were impressive and classy in their presentations as well.

We'll have more on Koppen and Lisicky in a column on Sunday in the newspaper.

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Finally, as for the game, Whitehall was impressive. These are not your father's Zephyrs. They get up and down the floor and were much quicker than CCHS tonight and that was the difference. The Vikings poor shooting from the outside didn't help either.

Congrats also to Nazareth on becoming the first LVC team to beat Liberty. I guess it has to be considered an upset, but we've been saying it for a long time that any team can't beat any other in the LVC on a given night and not even Liberty was going to run the table.

Source: Keith Groller