HOUSTON TAKES TITLE

When Tom Penders was approached to become the University of Houston men’s basketball coach six years ago, he bolted to the nearest elevator. The athletic director emphatically told him that the Cougars’ once mighty powerhouse, which was nicknamed Phi Slama Jama in the early 1980s because of the dunking of Hakeem Olajuwon, Larry Micheaux and Clyde Drexler, did not have the facilities or the money to be competitive in Conference USA. Nonetheless, he wanted to know whether Penders would be interested in the job. “He said he needed somebody who didn’t care about that stuff and that wasn’t spoiled,” Penders said Monday. “He was being so negative and telling me how impossible it was.” Penders discovered that he was being tested by his potential new boss, Dave Maggard, who ended up chasing him down at the elevator. A week later, Penders was given a contract that included an interesting incentive: it would pay him $8,000 for each win from No. 15 to No. 20 in a season, and more after that. (NY Times)