Tarkanian, Fresno State wait for end of probe

      FRESNO, Calif. -- The Fresno State Bulldogs were cruising toward a comfortable men's basketball victory over Wyoming, another step on their path to the NCAA Tournament, when the problems began.
      Up by 19 points with 3:36 left in that Feb. 20 game, the Bulldogs suddenly stumbled. Leading scorer Chris Herren was on the bench with a mild ankle sprain as Wyoming went on a 12-0 run to pull within seven points.
      As coach Jerry Tarkanian chewed nervously on a white towel, Fresno State point guard Dominick Young -- a 77 percent free-throw shooter -- missed three of four foul shots in the final minute. One was an air ball.
      The Bulldogs held on to win 76-68, and Young went to a nightclub to celebrate. Months later, that near collapse reverberates through the Fresno State program and through this San Joaquin Valley city.
      Rumors had enveloped the program for weeks. The Wyoming game bolstered insinuations of point shaving, an illegal practice in which players keep the final margin below the point spread to benefit certain gamblers.
      The spread in that game was 10 points. With Fresno State winning by eight, gamblers who bet against the Bulldogs won.
      Those rumors have turned into a federal probe, and that has led to grand jury subpoenas for game tapes and phone, scholarship and ticket distribution records from Fresno State. The school is conducting its own point-shaving investigation.
      The grand jury probe reportedly is focusing on Young and Herren, and on their relationships with a couple of local men allegedly involved in gambling.
      Federal investigators reportedly are looking into the relationship between Young and Kirk Vartanian, a used-car salesman who met with Young at the Eclipse nightclub after the Wyoming game.
      Also reportedly being probed is the relationship between Herren, once among the nation's top high school players and a prospective NBA guard, and pawnshop owner Dan Jelladian -- a friend of Vartanian's.
      Young, Herren, Vartanian and Jelladian have denied point shaving.
      "I'm not a bookie. I have not done anything wrong," Vartanian said in mid-April during a news conference at his brother's used car lot. "There's nothing to it; that's the real story. There's no point shaving whatsoever."
      But The Fresno Bee reported, based on sworn affidavits from two gamblers, that Jelladian had "insider information" on Fresno State games and that he paid bonuses to other gamblers to place bets for him. The newspaper reported he placed a $1,000 bet on the Wyoming game.
      The Los Angeles Times, quoting a member of a bookmaking ring, reported that "a Fresno pawnbroker" wagered $25,000 a game against Fresno State covering the point spread and that he gave players thousands of dollars and jewelry to shave points.
      The Bee also reported that the Internal Revenue Service is involved in the investigation.
      Tarkanian paid the IRS $32,123 in 1995 to settle a claim that he failed to pay taxes on basketball tickets he distributed while coaching at UNLV in the 1980s. The grand jury has subpoenaed records of the 90 free tickets Tarkanian receives for each Fresno State home game, but it is unclear whether those tickets are the focus of the IRS' involvement in this case.
      It could be months before the grand jury finishes its investigation, but the probe already has cost Fresno State its reputation and at least one talented recruit -- point guard Kenny Brunner of the Los Angeles.
      Brunner, considered one of the nation's top point guards, asked to be released from his national letter-of-intent at Fresno State because of the allegations.
      "I don't feel comfortable in the situation there," Brunner said. "I didn't think this (probe) would last as long, and no one can guarantee me 100 percent that nothing will happen to the program."
      Young's lawyer claims the entire probe is based on "rumors gone amuck," and said the investigation has been spurred in part by Tarkanian's reputation as a renegade coach who has battled the NCAA in the courts.
      ------
      Fresno, a city of 407,000 in the middle of California's farm belt, has never had a major professional sports team. Fans root for clubs in San Francisco or Los Angeles, each about a three-hour drive away.
      So it was a significant coup when the Bulldogs attracted Tarkanian, a Fresno State graduate and the coach with the best winning percentage in college basketball history, before the 1995-96 season.
      Tarkanian immediately turned around a team that had just two winning seasons in the previous decade.
      The Bulldogs barely missed getting selected for the NCAA Tournament in Tarkanian's first season. Perhaps scared off by the unfolding point-shaving allegations, the NCAA again left Fresno State out of its 64-team tournament last season despite a 20-12 record.
      But Tarkanian brought a reputation for trouble with him from UNLV, where he won a national title in 1990 while clashing repeatedly with the NCAA. His program also was ridiculed as being intertwined with gamblers.
      He has attracted players with troubled backgrounds to Fresno State.
      Herren, who broke his wrist in his first game at Boston College and then spent a cold Massachusetts winter partying himself out of playing shape, said he transferred to Fresno because he knew Tarkanian "is the type of guy that's been down the road that I have. He's had some troubles."
      Young, who already was playing for the Bulldogs when Tarkanian arrived, has had plenty of problems in Fresno.
      He agreed to pay a hotel $1,500 last year after a room he rented was trashed during a New Year's Eve party. He was suspended for the first four games of the 1995-96 season after failing to reimburse people who contributed toward his participation in a basketball tour he didn't attend.
      Vartanian said he talked with Young for a few minutes and bought him a Coke on Feb. 20 at the Eclipse, a night spot nestled between a dance studio and a video game emporium in a strip mall in north Fresno.
      When the point-shaving allegations surfaced, Young swore in a statement in early March denying he was the guest of Vartanian at the nightclub or that he received a free soft drink from Vartanian.
      At a news conference on March 10, Young added: "I don't recollect coming across the individual they are talking about."
      Tarkanian and Fresno State athletics director Al Bohl disputed the accuracy of Young's sworn statement.
      Herren visited Jelladian at United Loan and Jewelry, a pawnshop in downtown Fresno that has oversized copies of $100 bills lining its windows. Jelladian sells TVs, guns, diamonds and jewelry at his shop.
      ------
      Fresno State president John Welty said in mid-May the school's internal probe found no evidence of point shaving. That investigation is continuing.
      The federal grand jury heard from Vartanian's bookkeeper and at least one Fresno-area gambler. Kinney said Young set up an appointment with federal investigators to try to clear his name, but attorneys talked him out of it.
      Part of the evidence about alleged point shaving provided to federal investigators came from Fresno County Sheriff Steve Magarian.
      "While working on another investigation, information came forth about possible improprieties by some members of the Fresno State basketball team," Magarian said in March.
      Young has dropped out of school and hopes for a chance to play professionally in Europe. Herren has two years of eligibility left at FSU.
      Tarkanian has said he hopes the probe concludes quickly, clearing the players of any wrongdoing and letting the program focus on basketball again. But if point shaving is proven, Tarkanian said, his move will be clear.
      "I'll quit," he said. "That is the worst thing that can happen to a program."