Lopes isn't putting up with any problems

By Nathan Hathaway

Fresno State men’s basketball players have been lining themselves up, and coach Ray Lopes has been knocking them down.

Lopes has taken a hard line on player suspensions. He’s not putting up with any funny business. Lopes’ attitude seems to be one of “you screw up, you get punished.” Punishments have come in the form of serious suspensions from the team.

“ I’m doing what’s best for this team,” Lopes said. That attitude is what makes Lopes the perfect fit for the Fresno State basketball program.

Terry Pettis was first in line back before the season even started. He hit his girlfriend, beat the oil out of her car and kicked in her apartment window. Lopes promptly suspended him, indefinitely. It was two months and seven games before Pettis came back and immediately started contributing. Then Jonathan Woods and Renaldo Major started violating unspecified team rules.

Woods has now been suspended three times this season for a total of nine games, and the senior forward will not play in Saturday’s game against Boise State.

Major’s on his second suspension, and has missed seven games. The Fresno Bee reported last Friday that Major’s latest suspension is for failing a drug test. Major will also be MIA for Saturday’s game.

Pettis jumped back in line and got himself suspended for the rest of the season for “conduct detrimental to the team.” The suspension was announced one day after Pettis had been benched early in the Bulldogs’ loss at Louisiana Tech for having a “poor attitude.”

“ It’s no fun for me to coach problems,” Lopes said. “I want guys I can depend on, guys that care about the team, that put the team first, and guys that are committed to doing things the right way. That’s fun to coach.

“ I don’t like coaching problems. I don’t like coaching disappointments.”

Lopes is to be applauded for beginning to clean up a program that has been notorious for having problems in the past. Under coach Jerry Tarkanian, the Fresno State basketball program was shrouded in controversy. Academic fraud. Amateurism violations. Drug problems. NCAA sanctions.

Lopes has come in and cleaned house. He’s running a ship as tight as the state’s budget.

“ I don’t know what went on in the past,” Lopes said. “And I don’t dare compare what I do to what went on in the past.”

But everyone else does compare what he does to what went on in the past. And most Bulldogs fans should be happy with the direction he’s got the program going. As long as he keeps this up, the NCAA will, for the first time in a long time, remove the gigantic magnifying glass they’ve had on the Fresno State program.

“ I want to have fun,” Lopes said. “We all want to have fun winning and we all want to have fun competing and we all want to have fun being a team.

“ Those are the kind of guys I want to coach.”

With Lopes being tough on his players, he’ll soon be rid of all the disappointments and he’ll be coaching a squeaky-clean program with the type of guys he wants.