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Viking Champions: Al May
CHICAGO, IL (May 30, 2003) - Al May was the captain of North Park's first
national championship squad. A four-year letter winner at the school, the
6-foot-5-inch senior missed the first few games of his senior year due to
an illness, but came on strong at the end of the season as the team's power
forward.
"At the start of the season I don't think we ever thought we were going to
be as good as we were," May said. "We were a pretty young team - we had two
sophomores and a freshman starting - so there was a lot of question marks
there. But it's not always the talent that wins.
Even halfway through the season we weren't sure just how good we could be,"
May continued. "But then we started winning and winning with big numbers.
We got more confident in what we were doing and we kept going."
May grew up in McHenry, a far Northwest Chicago suburb, and came to North
Park after starring at Marian Central High School. Marian Central wasn't
exactly a basketball power at the time, but then again, neither was North
Park. May noted that the uniqueness of the Vikings' success was perhaps due
to the modest beginnings of its top players.
"It was pretty interesting the group of guys we came up with. It was a
little different than some championship teams that are built," he said. "I
wasn't that highly recruited. I was a good high school player, but out in
the sticks no one came out to watch you play. You had Michael Harper, who
was 6-foot-4 when he came (to North Park) and turned out to be 6-foot-10.
Modzel Greer wasn't highly recruited, but really made an improvement.
Florentine came from a junior college.
"We hung out together as a team," May continued. "There were no cliques and
we had fun as students. We had good team chemistry. That was a big part of
our success. And coach McCarrell and Bosko (Djurickovic) did a good job in
leading us. They knew when to be hard on us and when to take it easy."
Although May had been one of the top offensive players on the North Park
team as a sophomore and junior, he understood that his scoring would drop
with the progression of talents like Harper, and Greer and the addition of
newcomer Mike Thomas. It was a small price to pay for unparalleled success
for the Vikings. "As the captain, I tried to make sure that we stayed
(emotionally) up and played intense basketball," he said. "I knew what my
role was; I knew there weren't enough balls to go around. My focus was on
defense and rebounding. I normally got the assignment to guard the best
offensive player on the other team."
May's success in college basketball seems to have continued during his
adult life as well. He is corporate controller for Edward Don & Company in
North Riverside, the world's leading distributor of food service equipment
and supplies. He and wife Madeline raised three daughters and two of them
became collegiate athletes. Now living in Mount Prospect, May makes two or
three visits per season to watch basketball games at North Park. He said
that walking into the 1,500-seat gym still brings back fond memories.
"That last year was just amazing," said May of the 1977-78 season. "I come
back now and the gym looks so small. But when I was there the gym was
packed. They put in additional seats and people lined the floor. I know
when you were a visiting team it would be hard to focus because of the
fans."
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