Bowling Green State University Athletics
Elyria Chronicle Feature On Anthony Stacey By Steve Byrne
August 09, 2006 | Men's Basketball
Aug. 9, 2006
Elyria, Ohio -
He insists it's no big deal. It happens quite often. Things are
different over there.
"Players change teams a lot," said Anthony Stacey about the LEB, the
Spanish basketball league in which the former Midview star now plays.
"Over there, if a team does not win, it's a quick fix to get
better," Stacey added. "Spain is a small country, not like the U.S.
All the clubs are pretty close together, so it's not so bad going
from one to another."
Stacey, a 6-foot-4 small forward who played his college ball at
Bowling Green, is back in Elyria, his hometown, for now. He will
return to Spain next week to prepare for his sixth LEB season and,
he hopes, be part of a quick fix for Caja Rural Melilla.
Melilla finished 15th in the 18-team LEB last season (14-20). Stacey
will be one of five new players trying to earn the club a higher
spot in the standings and possibly a playoff berth. Drac Inca, the
team for which Stacey played in 2005-06, made the playoffs last
season. The club was swept in the best-of-three opening round by
eventual champion Bruesca-Guipuzcoa.
Melilla is the most remote outpost in the otherwise tightly knit LEB.
In fact, it's the most isolated place in Spain. It's not in Spain at
all, geographically. The city of 65,000 sits on the North African
coast of the Mediterranean, a five-square-mile area surrounded on
three sides by Morocco. It's a half-hour airplane ride to mainland
Spain and an 8-hour trip by boat.
It's also the most potentially volatile place in the nation; a free
port populated mainly by Spanish Catholics and North African
Muslims, with significant Jewish and Hindu minorities as well.
Although the city advertises itself as an example of different
cultures living in harmony, there's an undercurrent of simmering
tension -- political and economic -- between ethnic groups. Stacey
says such intrigue doesn't intrigue him.
"I'm looking forward to it," he said. "I don't think there will be a
problem. I see this as a great opportunity. I like their coach a lot
(Paco Olmos, in his first season with Melilla). I know him from
playing against him. Plus, it was a very good contract."
Stacey appears to have settled in nicely in Spain. He now speaks
fluent Spanish -- not bad for a guy who only had two years of Spanish
classes at Midview.
"I have been lucky to have spent five of my six seasons living on
the Mediterranean," he said. "It's so beautiful. You can't beat
that. I've also been an all-star twice and played on two
championship teams (Murcia and Manresa)."
He was also lucky to have met his wife, Jero, at a dinner party on
the island of Mallorca. Unlike Stacey's coaches, none of whom spoke
English, Jero spoke her future husband's native language "perfectly"
and helped Stacey with Spanish.
An added benefit of Stacey being wed to a Mallorcan; it allows him
to skirt the LEB rule that no more than two Americans be on any one
team.
"They consider me a Spaniard now, because I married one," Stacey
said.
Stacey, 29, holds almost all the scoring and rebounding records at
Midview. He averaged 30 points and 13.4 rebounds as a senior and
once scored 41 of the Middies' 51 points in a game. He started all
four years at BGSU for coaches Jim Larranaga and Dan Dakich, leading
the Falcons in scoring during his junior and senior seasons.
Stacey had a tryout with the Cleveland Cavaliers after leaving
Bowling Green in 2000. He was cut right before the start of the
regular season and weighed his options before deciding Spain might
be the place to begin a pro basketball career.
The LEB is the middle level of the three Spanish leagues, with ACB
being the top league and the LEB2 being below the LEB. Like the
English soccer leagues, teams in Spain can move up or down depending
on performance.
Very much unlike the NBA, which has an 82-game schedule and
seemingly endless playoff series, the Spanish clubs play once a
week, with a 34-game regular season.
"The bad part is that they practice two or three times a week,"
Stacey said. "That's what they're about -- practice, practice,
practice.
"That's why the Americans have so much trouble internationally. They
pass more over here, and they all can shoot."
American friendly
The web site for Eurobasket lists 198 "import players" from the
United States, and there are some pretty well-known names on the
list.
Stacey, who graduated from Midview in 1995, isn't the only area
legend now playing basketball in Spain. Sam Clancy, a Fairview Park
resident who led St. Edward to the 1998 Division I state
championship, will be playing for Menorca this season. Clancy, an
All-American at Southern California, was a second-round draft pick
of the Philadelphia 76ers in 2002 and spent one year with the team.
Bryce Drew, who had six years in the NBA with Houston, Chicago and
Charlotte/New Orleans, played at Pamesa last season. Drew was
immortalized in March Madness lore when he sank a half-court shot at
the horn to give underdog Valparaiso a win over Mississippi in the
1998 NCAA Tournament.
Two more recent college stars, both extraordinary shooters, are
working in Spain. Blake Stepp, a 2004 All-American at Gonzaga who
made a brief appearance with the Cavs, was a teammate of Drew's on
Pamesa. Hollis Price, a 2003 alumnus of Oklahoma, was a member of
CFS Sevilla last year.
All those players are in the higher-caliber ACB. Perhaps the most
recognizable name in the LEB, the league in which Stacey plays, is
Scooter Barry, son of NBA Hall of Famer Rick and brother of former
and current NBA players Jon, Brent and Drew.
Barry, who turns 40 on Aug. 13, was a member of the 1988 NCAA
champion Kansas team and now plays for defending LEB champ Leon.
"I know Scooter," Stacey said. "I've had dinner with him. He's a
nice guy with a lot of good stories."
