Out of print for more than 30 years, now available for the first time as an eBook, this is the controversial story of John Wooden's first 25 years and first 8 NCAA Championships as UCLA Head Basketball Coach. This is the only book that gives a true picture of the character of John Wooden and the influence of his assistant, Jerry Norman, whose contributions Wooden  ignored and tried to bury.

Compiled with more than 40 hours of interviews with Coach Wooden, learn about the man behind the coach. The players tell their their stories in their own words.

Click the book to read the first chapter and for ordering information. Also available on Kindle.

2013 NFL Playoffs Third Round

by Tony Medley

If football games were 59 minutes 30 seconds long, I would have been 4-0 last weekend. Two of my picks had the lead with 30 seconds to go and the ball on the opponents' 30 yard line, 70 yards from paydirt. Alas, my pick of Denver was victimized by a 70 yard touchdown pass with 30 seconds left, caused by the dumbest defensive play in the history of the NFL. My pick of Seattle fell victim to two 25 yard passes with less than 30 seconds to go, and a dumb timeout call by former USC coach Pete Carroll, allowing Atlanta to salvage an undeserved two-point victory on the second to last play of the game.

Truth be told, I was silently pulling for Baltimore to beat Denver because I do not like Denver. Why? Because of the classless way they and their President, John Elway, treated Tim Tebow. Last year Tebow took over a team that was 1-4 and took them to the second round of the playoffs. Despite this, Elway couldn't wait to get rid of him, and his former teammates on the Broncos trashed him anonymously, one saying, "he hurt us all year long." Yeah, sure. If you don't like someone and want to talk about it at least have the courage to put your name behind it. But was Denver better off with Peyton Manning this year than with Tim Tebow last year? After a bye, Manning lost in the first playoff game they played; Tebow won a wild card playoff game against Pittsburgh, taking them to the second round of the playoffs, and Tebow's team didn't have near the talent this team possesses. Manning was pitiful in the second half when the game was on the line. You be the judge.

Denver lost this game because of the stupid defensive play, but also because Manning threw two interceptions and had one lost fumble. The second interception was so ill-advised that it rises to the level of being called "Favre-like." So I'm happy that Baltimore won this game, even though I picked Denver.

I was right about San Francisco beating Green Bay and New England blowing out Houston. Why anybody thought such a seriously flawed team like Green Bay had a ghost of a chance to beat San Francisco is beyond me, but I'm not going into that because I put my reasons for the picks in last week's column.

Seattle overcame a woeful start and totally outplayed Atlanta in the second half, scoring what looked like the winning touchdown with 31 seconds left. But Matt Ryan threw two pressure packed strikes to get within field goal range. Then former SC coach Pete Carroll made the mistake of using his brain and called one of those idiotic last second timeouts to "freeze" the kicker. The kicker missed that kick and Seattle would have won. But he made the second kick and Carroll deserved to lose for calling the ridiculous "freezing" time out that's so popular with these NFL coaches who seem cloistered from common sense.

Here's how I see Sunday's conference finals:

San Francisco at Atlanta: Atlanta played a good first half (or was it just that Seattle hadn't awakened yet?), and then completely folded in the second half against Seattle (or was it that it took Seattle that long to adjust and play its normal game?). Seattle's team is a carbon copy of San Francisco, but without the high quality running game of the 49ers, since Seattle's best runner was operating on an injured ankle. 49er quarterback , Colin Kaepernick, is as good a runner as Seattle's Russell Wilson, if not better, and is faster. Matt Ryan is going to need to scramble against San Francisco's defense, and that's not his forte. I think San Francisco has more talent and is better coached. Even though they are on the road, they should beat Atlanta.

Baltimore at New England: I have thought that New England would be in the Super Bowl for quite a while. However Baltimore's quarterback, Joe Flacco, has thrown some exceptionally accurate long passes when the pressure was on (he missed some wide open receivers when the pressure wasn't on). With the pressure on he threw spectacular long passes to Anquon Boldin and Jacoby Jones. They were perfect strikes. Although Baltimore's defense is so old it needs constant application of WD-40 to keep out the squeaks, it put constant pressure on Denver's Peyton Manning and completely shut down Denver's offense. In fact 40% of Denver's touchdowns were on kick returns. One could say that without special teams, Denver never would've been in the game.  New England has a bend but don't break defense. It allows a lot of yards, but is very good defending in the red zone. While Brady does not react well to pressure, Baltimore's ancient defense has been on the field for more than 160 plays in the last two games. It won't get much rest against New England's Oregon Ducks-inspired uptempo offense and could be exhausted if this game come down to the final minutes. Brady runs a brilliant short passing game, so it will be hard for Baltimore to pressure him when he gets rid of the ball so fast and sees all his available receivers in the blink of an eye, something Flacco doesn't do. Although I could easily be 7-1 again going into these two conference finals, as I have been the last few years, at 5-3 my gut urges me to pick Baltimore in a big upset. Since my gut told me to pick Cincinnati in an upset two weeks ago, though, I'm sticking with my brain and New England.