November 27, 1998
NEW YORK - Ed Cota grew up in Brooklyn, N.Y., playing schoolyardbasketball on concrete courts and dreaming about doing it on the hardwood ofMadison Square Garden.
When the North Carolina junior finally got there, he made sure it wasmemorable.
Cota, the shortest man on the court at 6-foot-1, threw in 17 points andgrabbed 11 rebounds, leading No. 9 North Carolina to the Preseason NITchampionship Friday night with a 57-49 victory over No. 3 Stanford in a gameboth teams wished they could have played last spring.
It was an MVP performance for Cota, who threw in four free throws in thelast 72 seconds and provided the backcourt leadership for a young, tall TarHeels team.
"What a great homecoming," Cota said. "Our defense and our rebounding wasthe key. I made a concentrated effort to crash the boards.
"We have a lot of talent. It's a matter of time. Moving the ball aroundtakes us a long way."
This was a game both teams wanted to play last March.
The Tar Heels and Cardinal reached the Final Four of the NCAA tournament butwere eliminated in the semifinals, North Carolina losing to Utah and Stanfordknocked off by eventual champion Kentucky.
So the Preseason NIT championship was sort of a peak at what might havebeen. Stanford has all five starters back from its Final Four team but NorthCarolina is a new-look squad with veterans Cota and Ademola Okulaja surroundedby freshmen and sophomores.
"Give credit to the young players on this team who are following everybodywho has played here before," Cota said.
Coach Bill Guthridge wasn't certain what the new players would give himagainst a veteran Stanford team.
"I had no idea how good we'd be with a lot of question marks," he said."And I still don't know with six games. But I'm pleased to be 6-0 and win thechampionship. You can't do better than that."
It was North Carolina's eighth victory in the series and the fifth time ithas beaten Stanford (4-1) in the championship game of a tournament.
"We went out there and weren't hesitant as a young team," said JasonCapel, one of North Carolina's freshmen. "We weren't scared."
North Carolina took charge early, racing to a 12-4 lead. But Stanford cameback to lead 19-17 on a 3-point shot by Ryan Mendez.
Then the Tar Heels went on a 15-2 run and took a 32-23 lead at halftime.
Stanford narrowed it to three points with less than two minutes left.
That's when Cota took over, hitting four free throws sandwiched around a bigblock by freshman Kris Lang. It locked up the tournament MVP award for thejunior guard.
Two late 3-pointers by Arthur Lee couldn't dent North Carolina's lead as theTar Heels converted their free throws down the stretch. The baskets were Lee'sfirst after he had missed nine shots. Tim Young went 3-for-12 as Stanford madejust 18 of 63 attempts.
"If you don't win the war on the boards and you shoot 28 percent, you'renot going to win," said Stanford coach Mike Montgomery. "But it's early inthe season."
Jarron Collins led Stanford with 10 points.
No. 14 Purdue edged No. 23 St. John's 70-69 in the consolation game forthird place.
By HAL BOCK
AP Sports Writer