RIP Dean The DREAM Meminger

[wtm97]

RIP Dean "The DREAM" Meminger

Sad to hear of the passing at age 65 of Dean “The Dream” Meminger, found dead in a Harlem hotel room this week. He was a legendary NYC ‘playgrounder’, who went to Rice HS then on to Marquette to play for Al McGuire, where he became a first team All-American, averaging 18.8 points for three seasons, and was named MVP of the 1970 N.I.T which they won over Lou Carnesseca's St. John’s team. BTW, our 14-11 Dave Gavitt led Friars, (Craig Callen, Ray Johnson, Jim Larranaga, Vic Collucci, Donnie Lewis, Gary Wilkins), had a wild and improbable 58-57 home W vs. a strong, (Billy Paultz, Jim Smyth, Ralph Abraham), 21-8 SJU team that season.

The 1970 NIT was made famous as Al McGuire and the 23-6 Marquette Warriors  spurned the NCAA Tourney that year to go to the NIT.  It was a 'must watch' tourney that year because ‘take every shot’ Pistol Pete Maravich, (career 44.2 ppg), was there with his LSU team.  LSU lost in the semi’s to an improbable 22-6 Army team coached by a guy named  Bobby Knight, (Mike ‘Coach K’ Krzyzewski had graduated the year before from Army BTW).

Meminger, small at 6’ 1 “, was drafted by the Knicks and was an ‘all-purpose’ back-up for both Clyde Frazier & Earl the Pearl Monroe on the 1973 title team.

In the Eastern Finals vs. the #1 seed Celtics, with the emerging bull  Dave Cowens + Don Chaney, Jo Jo White, Paul Silas, etc.) Team leader was still John Havilcek who got injured yet famously played with a sling and was only shooting left-handed!

This was were the young Meminger had his moment of glory when he literally shut down Jo Jo White, the Knicks won and then beat LA for the NBA title. “Dean went out and shut Jo Jo down, and we won that game,” said Phil Jackson, the former Knicks forward and Bulls and Lakers coach. “It was a signature performance in our history.”

Known as a whirlwind dribbling upcourt, a superb defensive player and a clever ball handler with fine court sense, Meminger had a statistically ‘so-so’ 6 year NBA career averaging some 6 ppg largely in spot roles.

Meminger had long battled an addiction to cocaine in his post-playing career, yet still did stints coaching here and there and hanging around the game as best he could – he was seriously injured in a fire in 2009.

Al McGuire, famous for his quips, once said Meminger was “quicker than 11:15 Mass at a seaside resort.”

Parts of this are from here:  www.nytimes.com/2013/08/24/sports/basketball/dean-meminger-who-helped-knicks-to-a-title-dies-at-65.html?_r=0

(the rest of this is from my deranged head and other sources)

[dex]

Al McGuire, famous for his quips, once said Meminger was “quicker than 11:15 Mass at a seaside resort.”

Good ole Al was a one of a kind

[pc1971]

I attended that St. John's game.

Nice win for our Friars.

[wtm97]

Dean Meminger defined cool during his Marquette years

www.jsonline.com/sports/dean-meminger-defined-cool-during-his-marquette-years-b9982182z1-220958611.html

Bob Wolfley
Aug. 24, 2013

As uncool and tragic and sad much of Dean Meminger'slife may have been, there may not have been a cooler, more majestic, more magnetic player in Marquette's basketball history.

Meminger was found dead Friday in a Harlem hotel. He was 65.

Some reports have said he died of a drug overdose. He has battled drug addiction most of his adult life.
But let us pause just a moment to catalog the cool.

A player from Harlem who played at a predominantly white, Catholic university in Milwaukee. Cool.

A player from Rice High School who was only the second player in New York City high school basketball history to make first team All-City three straight years. Lew Alcindor did it first. Cool.

The nickname, "Dean the Dream." Cool. Or simply, "The Dream." Cooler.

A player whose body proportion did not appear to be basketball ideal, yet was lethal. Cool.

Praying mantis-like arms and big hands. An odd duck scuttle foot action. Little calves. Big thighs. Slouchy gait on the dribble, with magical ball-handling skills. A big noggin perfectly suited for cartoon caricature. The Cheshire cat grin.

Conducted lots of business around the basket. Defended. Cool.

Came up big in big games. Poised when games hung in the balance. Cool.

And anyone who shows up in PeteAxthelm'sseminal book, "The City Game," is by definition cool.

In that book, Axthelm recounts Marquette's renegade march to and through the 1970 National Invitation Tournament.

"Louisiana State coach Press Maravich chided McGuire for his old-fashioned style in which, Press quipped, 'The kids make forty passes to set up a thirty-foot shot.' Watching Marquette play, Maravich added, 'was like watching grass grow.'

"McGuire and his team quietly bore the criticism until after they had routed Louisiana State, all but shutting out record-breaking scorer Pete Maravich, the coach's son. Then the Marquette players shouted jubilantly, 'We mowed his lawn tonight.'"

McGuire said after the game: "He's good, but I'd take Dean Meminger against him one-on-one up in Harlem any day." Said Meminger: "There are a lot of cats in the parks that are just as tough as Maravich."

Upon such games, upon such storytelling, are programs built and wondrous mythical kinWowoms created.
Marquette beat LSU, 101-79, and went on to beat St. John's in the final. Meminger was name the MVP. It was at Madison Square Garden. Cool, cool and cool again.

As recounted in Joe Moran'sbook, "You Can Call Me Al," Meminger narrowed his college choices to five: UCLA, Michigan State, Cincinnati, Providence and St. Joseph's.

"UCLA was already established," Meminger said. "I knew that I could start there. I met with John Wooden and (assistant coach) Denny Crum at UCLA. The lifestyle was different for me, California laid back. Everything was on a silver plate. What was the challenge? Wooden told me I would be the heir to Mike Warren. With Kareem (Abdul-Jabbar) we could win more titles."

But Meminger said no to Wooden.

Who in the world says no to John Wooden? Cool.

After he recruited Meminger in 1967, McGuire brought him to some high school clinics he had set up at various high schools in Wisconsin. Even though the dunk had been eliminated in college basketball before the 1966-'67 season, McGuire invited Meminger to show the kids at the clinic how to dunk a basketball.

Meminger hattered the backboard.

"Al was just left speechless," MU broadcaster Tom Collins told Moran.

Al McGuire speechless? Cool.

Glimpses of his painful struggles away from basketball emerged from time to time when Meminger was alive, and more no doubt will be recounted now that he has passed away.

But whatever nightmare Meminger's life became, it was all Dream when he played for Marquette.