Just No Time to Take a Timeout : It’s a Life of All Work and All Play for Cypress Basketball’s Bill Dobbs

Don Johnson has seen quite a few players come through his basketball program at Cypress College over the past 19 years, but none has impressed the coach more than Bill Dobbs.

Johnson has had better players than Dobbs. After all, Swen Nater and Mark Eaton turned their games around at Cypress before eventually landing in the National Basketball Assn. But in terms of drive and determination, Dobbs is in a league all by himself.

“This young man has what we coaches look for and talk a lot about, but generally see only a little in most players,” Johnson said. “Bill has a large amount of character.”

Dobbs, a 6-foot 1-inch sophomore guard, may be the hardest working player in community college basketball, and he doesn’t limit his efforts to basketball. In addition to holding a full-time job as an electronics technician on the graveyard shift in Anaheim, Dobbs is taking 12 units at Cypress and is supporting a family.

Dobbs, 26, has a schedule that would force men of lesser fortitude to give up either work or basketball . . . or their family. “On a Monday, for example, I get out of work at 7 (a.m.) and I have my first class at 9,” Dobbs said.

“I come home (after work), eat and make it to school for my 9 o’clock class. From 10 to 12, I have a two-hour break, so that gives me some time to study. I stay at school and at 12, I have a political science class. That class ends at 1:30, and then I go to the gym and get taped up and work out to get ready for practice.

“Practice starts at 2:50 and goes to 5. Usually, by the time I get showered and get home, it’s about 6 o’clock. That leaves me about five hours before I leave to go to work. Being that I haven’t been to sleep, four of those hours are spent sleeping, and one hour I spend with my son (3-year-old William) and my wife and eating.”

So what drives Dobbs to such extremes?

“I guess my motivation is to get my bachelor’s degree,” he said. “Since I came out of high school, I’ve wanted to get my degree. I have two years to go.

I would like to transfer to a school that has a decent communications program, but tuition costs so much. If I could get at least a partial scholarship, that would help me out tremendously.” (Dobbs’ eligibility has expired as far as Division I programs go, but he can play for two more seasons at an NAIA school or below Division I.)

Dobbs’ wife of four years, Elora, said that living with her husband’s routine has its difficult moments.

“It’s been a little strain, but not unbearable,” she said, “He doesn’t spend as much time with us as he used to; we don’t talk as much as we usually do. I miss talking to him. Sometimes I get things on my mind and I don’t have anybody to tell them to.”

Dobbs agreed with his wife that his schedule is hard on his family, especially his son.

“It’s a strain on my son because he wants me to play with him and I have to keep putting him off until the weekend,” Dobbs said. “Whenever I come home, he comes running to the door and greets me and says, ‘Are you ready to play now?’ I have to tell him no because I have to go lie down. I don’t like to do that, but sometimes I have to.

“My wife has to deal with me whether I’m in a good mood or a bad mood. She has to deal with it all, and she’s been real good about it. She hasn’t taken a pot and beat me upside my head yet, but I know there’s been times when she’s wanted to.”

Despite operating on just four hours sleep a day during the week, Dobbs has performed admirably for the Chargers. A complete player, Dobbs is the team’s leading scorer, averaging more than 13 points a game, and averages five rebounds and three assists. Johnson also considers Dobbs to be one of the best defensive guards he’s ever had.

Still, there are times when it takes Dobbs all he has to drag himself into class or into the gym. During a game in the Chargers’ tournament, Dobbs admitted he was daydreaming on the court. Johnson pulled him out of the game and sent him out of the gym, telling him to return when he was ready to play. Dobbs contemplated leaving the team then, but teammate Greg Marusich, who was injured and not dressed for the game, followed Dobbs out of the gym and urged him to stay with the team.

“I’ve had a couple of low points where I’ve thought to myself, ‘I really don’t have to do this,’ ” Dobbs said. “During the year . . . I’ve felt I wasn’t doing well and wasn’t helping the team. I was thinking about leaving the team to help those guys and just continue to work. In talking with the coaches, though, they encouraged me to continue on.”

Said Johnson: “Sometimes you see him dragging into practice, but he never misses. He has learned and he continues to improve. He certainly deserves a lot of credit. He’s somehow getting enough sleep to do well in some tough classes, and he still performs well on the court. I think the other players have a little bit of awed respect for him.”

Dobbs’ accomplishments are all the more impressive when you consider that he did not play basketball in high school. After graduating from junior high, he attended a new school, Edward R. Murrow in New York City, that didn’t have a sports program. Dobbs honed his basketball skills in pick-up games and winter leagues but was not offered a basketball scholarship after graduation.

Dobbs was a walk on at St. Francis College in Brooklyn, where he stayed with the team until the final cut his first year. He continued to work out with the team as a freshman and made the squad the following year, though he received minimal playing time. Dobbs made the team again as a junior, but injured himself just before the start of the season and could not play.

Dobbs dropped out of school and continued to work for a year before joining the Air Force, where he refined his basketball skills during a four-year tour of duty.

In his one season at Cypress, Dobbs has left an indelible impression on Johnson.

“He’s just been a delight to work with,” Johnson said. “If you had a roster full of Dobbs’, you’d see less coaches dropping out of the profession.”