LinkFormer MSU basketball coach: No qualms about recruiting practices
By BECKY BOHRER
Associated Press
BILLINGS, Mont. -- The former Montana State University basketball coach who helped recruit Branden Miller, a one-time starting point guard now facing a murder charge, says character was a top priority in evaluating prospective athletes.
With Miller, a sometimes harsh leader on the basketball court who was quiet elsewhere, "we sure didn't think that we took big gambles on character," Mick Durham said Monday.
Durham also told The Associated Press he has no concerns about campus recruiting practices, even as MSU President Geoff Gamble has vowed to take a closer look at these and other practices in the wake of the murder investigation and ongoing concerns about drug use on the Bozeman campus.
Coaches do the best they can in recruiting "quality" student athletes and should be trusted as they go about the work, Durham said.
"I think if you're working hard and doing your homework and doing your job, I don't think it's hit or miss," he said. "You don't want to let one or two kids spoil it for the 95 percent that are solid and doing good for MSU, and that's what happens sometimes with situations like this."
Miller and John LeBrum, a former redshirt football player, have been charged with murder in the shooting of Jason Wright, whose body was found June 23 at MSU's agronomy farm near the edge of Bozeman. Authorities suspect Wright dealt in cocaine. Miller and LeBrum, from Wisconsin and Florida respectively, were held on bail of $1 million each.
Each was dismissed from his team, Miller in December for academic reasons and LeBrum in August 2004 for violating rules of the football team. LeBrum withdrew from MSU around the same time, a university spokeswoman said Monday. Miller attended MSU until the spring semester this year but left before the semester ended, the school said.
On Friday, a day after the arrests, Gamble announced plans for a university review of recruiting and other practices. In a letter dated Monday, he said a consultant will be asked to examine how student athletes are recruited. Gamble said he wants to ensure that MSU does all it can "to bring in student athletes who will be successful."
"Academics are my No. 1 priority for student athletes, and it does no good for any coach to recruit a student athlete who cannot be successful academically," he wrote in the letter, which the school said was being circulated among faculty, students, alumni and others.
Durham said coaches share concerns about helping athletes succeed in the classroom. Coaches also concern themselves with character and how a prospect might fit in both at MSU and in Bozeman, he said.
In Miller's case, Durham said he recalled about six occasions in which he or an assistant spent time with Miller or otherwise tried to get to know or learn about him before he joined the Bobcats. Miller, now 22, transferred to MSU from Colby Community College in Kansas.
Miller's coach at Colby, Brian Ostermann, said Miller was a competitive leader who was willing to work hard. Ostermann couldn't recall a game that Miller missed -- for any reason -- during the athlete's two years at the school.
Ostermann, who now coaches at Missouri State University-West Plains, said he kept track of Miller's progress through Durham and shared Durham's "disappointment" when Miller became ineligible to play late last year.
"He was a quiet kid" with a great understanding of basketball, Durham said. "During the recruitment, I didn't foresee anything like this coming."
http://www.billingsgazette.net/articles ... murder.txt
