HOME and AWAY

LAS CRUCES, N.M. —  Lou Henson flashes a vast-as-the-prairie grin and almost hops from behind his desk in the New Mexico State basketball office.

His 36 years in college basketball have slowed him, some. The patch of red hair that sparked is-it-live-or-is-it-Memorex debates is thinner, grayer and clearly his own. But the smile still beams disarmingly.

Few schoomze better.

Henson sits on the couch to chat instead of speaking from across the desk. He punctuates his points with a light touch on the shoulder. This is a conversation with your favorite college professor.

Things haven’t always been so friendly in this office.

Behind the desk, brought out of retirement with Henson, is the third-place trophy from the 1969-70 season--when Henson took the Aggies to their only Final Four. It has been polished, not a speck of tarnish on it.

Symbolic? Without a doubt.

Henson returned in October of 1997, just days before practice was to begin. He was asked to do more than coach basketball.

The program under Neil McCarthy had reached the crisis stage. There was an NCAA probation and an abysmal 11% graduation rate during his 12 years.

McCarthy, the school’s winningest coach with a record of 248-123, was reassigned. He then sued for breach of contract. Fearing that the conflict between school officials and a popular coach would split the tightly knit, basketball-loving community, administrators already had a plan.

Who better to smooth things over than the prodigal coach?

Henson had spent nine seasons at New Mexico State and transformed the Aggies back-water program into a national power, then headed off to Illinois for more success. When he retired as Illini coach in 1996, it was supposed to be the end of an illustrious career.

Only he couldn’t refuse a plea from home.

“I was hesitant to take it,” Henson said of the job offer. “I thought, ‘Do I want to get involved in all this?’ Of course, had it not been my alma mater, I wouldn’t have done it. At my age, it wouldn’t be worth it.”

Besides, it was only a six-month gig . . .

*

Six months has stretched into three seasons.

New Mexico State officials gave McCarthy an $850,000 out-of-court settlement last January. Henson took the Aggies to the NCAA tournament last March, picking up his 700th victory along the way.

Neil who?

“This was divine intervention, as far as I’m concerned,” said former Athletic Director Jim Paul, who had fired McCarthy and coaxed Henson out of retirement. “He was available and we needed help desperately. Lou had played here and coached here. He seemed the answer to all our problems.”

The Aggies’ woes are restricted to the court--not the courts--this season. They are 18-8 and 9-5 in the Big West Conference heading into Thursday night’s game against North Texas. Their inconsistency, though, frustrates Henson, who didn’t amass 722 victories by accepting defeat easily.

“He’s almost a Dr. Jekylly and Mr. Hyde,” said Las Cruces Onate High Coach Richard Robinson, who played for Henson at New Mexico State in the 1974-75 season. “You meet him on the street or in a restaurant and he’s the gentleman’s gentleman. When you put the practice gear on and step between those lines, it is all business. There are no excuses. You are held accountable.”

Competitive? Years ago, Henson had a gallstone removed. Bob Evans, a close friend, had the same surgery about the same time. The two bet a steak dinner on who had the larger stone.

Henson, worried that his did not measure up, picked out a small rock from his garden and won the bet.

“Oh, Lou doesn’t like to lose at anything, whether it’s a basketball game or the size of his gallstone,” said Mary Henson, his wife of 46 years.

Basketball is again his outlet.

“Was I surprised that he went back to coaching? No,” said Illinois Chicago Coach Jimmy Collins, who played for Henson at New Mexico State and was his assistant at Illinois.

“I was surprised when he got out of it. Bill Shoemaker is a jockey. Jim Brown is a football player. Lou Henson is a basketball coach. But I think New Mexico State was the only job that could bring him back.”

Certainly Henson, the son of an Oklahoma sharecropper who grew up in a house that had no indoor plumbing, doesn’t need the money. In fact, he worked the first season for $1 a month--77 cents after taxes--and still has the two three-month checks.

He stayed on and was given a four-year contract.

“When I discussed it with Mary, I guaranteed her six months,” Henson said. “There are two or three reasons I stayed on. No. 1 is I wanted to help out this institution.”

*

There was an hour to go before the Aggies were to play UC Irvine and Henson was not with his team. He was in the hospitality room checking the food. He then sauntered through the crowd, shaking hands and smiling--always smiling.

“How many coaches with 700 wins would be shaking hands an hour before the game?” Paul said. “How many coaches without 700 wins would do that? Lou Henson would be a shoo-in for senator if he wanted that. He works a room better than any politician.”

Being reelected in Las Cruces wasn’t that easy. McCarthy may not have been the most charming man in town, but he was popular because he won. In 12 seasons, the Aggies went to the NCAA tournament six times, and reached the Sweet 16 in 1992.

One former New Mexico State coach said McCarthy would often tell his players, “You know what that ‘N.M. State’ on your jersey stands for? Neil McCarthy State.”

The price, however, was getting exorbitant.

In a three-month period before McCarthy was fired, two of his players were arrested for drunk driving. Another was twice charged with domestic violence misdemeanors.

The program also had been placed on three years’ probation in 1995, for violations including academic fraud for correspondence courses taken by two junior college transfers.

In a five-year period from 1992-97, only one player graduated, according to Paul, the former athletic director.

In his last four seasons, McCarthy had an incentive in his contract that would pay him $50,000 if the team had a 2.0 grade-point-average. Twice, Paul said, McCarthy didn’t get the money.

In contrast, four Aggie players--two starters--had 4.0 grade-point averages last semester. And the team had a 2.96 GPA.

“Let’s face facts, they weren’t graduating players,” Henson said.

Not everyone in Las Cruces was concerned whether the players got A’s, Bs, Cs, or even Fs as long as they got Ws.

“The first year was tough,” Henson said. “The other coaching staff was still in town and some of the players never bought into what we were trying to do.”

The Aggies won 18 games but did not qualify for the conference tournament. McCarthyism--the Neil version--was in the air.

There was even an ugly scene, when McCarthy happened to be at the El Paso airport to pick up his wife at the same time the Aggies were returning from a trip. Witnesses said--and McCarthy later admitted--he publicly berated Henson, who declined to discuss the incident.

“Initially, the community was torn down the middle,” Paul said. “There were people who were thrilled that Lou would come back. When he got us to the NCAA tournament last year, everyone was back on board.”

*

Henson didn’t run for the Aggie job when Paul called in 1997, but he couldn’t run from it. Las Cruces is home.

“We had always planned to spend the winters in Las Cruces,” Mary Henson said. “We’re doing that. We’re just going to more basketball games than we expected.”

Henson had retired after a lifetime in basketball. The last 21 seasons at Illinois had been sweet and bittersweet. He inherited a program that was on probation and took the Illini to heights they had never known--12 NCAA tournaments and a Final Four appearance in 1989.

But under Henson, the Illini also were placed on a three-year probation by the NCAA for recruiting violations in 1990, although NCAA officials said there was no evidence to substantiate more serious allegations about offering cash and cars to recruits.

When Henson stepped down after the 1995-96 season, many said it was time. Even Henson was ready. There were grandkids to entertain.

A year later, his play time was reduced.

Anything for the Aggies.

Thirty-four years ago, Henson returned to Las Cruces as coach, after four seasons at Hardin Simmons, where he integrated the basketball team and, thus, integrated the college.

There was no arena at New Mexico State, just a gym. Henson recruited in Mississippi, at the time the civil rights movement was flourishing and an out-of-state license plate was often an immediate target.

“I’d pull into a gas station in my Volkswagen and they’d ask, ‘What are you doing here?’ ” Henson said. “I’d tell them, ‘I’m just recruiting basketball players.’ ”

He did just that, tapping talent ignored by Southern schools to make the Aggies a power. They went to the NCAA tournament his first five seasons, including the third-place finish in 1969-70.

Yet the priority wasn’t on victories.

“After my senior season, I got a job in a pizza parlor,” Robinson said. “Coach had been at Illinois a year and I hadn’t seen him for a long time. One day, he happened to drop by the pizza parlor. The first thing he said was, ‘Did you graduate?’ I hadn’t and he started telling me why I should stick with it. He didn’t say anything about basketball.”

Robinson got his degree.

*

So how much longer? Not even Henson knows.

“As long as I think things are progressing and I feel good, and it’s OK with Mary, then I will stay,” he said.

The thing that brought him back keeps him here: the university.

“Lou would go with me to the state capitol that first year,” Paul said. “We’d leave El Paso at 6 a.m. and he’d work state officials all day for the university. Then we’d fly home that evening. This was on his days off.

“A lot of people find it hard to believe somebody can be that good of a coach, that good of a recruiter and still be that sincere, that likable and that enjoyable.”