MORGANTOWN — There is this thing in sports — no, make that life, for really there is little difference — that is called greatness.

Defining it is difficult because it comes in too many different forms to be put into any real classification.

Greatness can be as quiet as Jerry West or as flamboyant as Hot Rod Hundley. It can be as outlandish as Muhammad Ali, as arrogant as Barry Bonds or as unassuming as Jerry Rice.

What it can’t be is denied.

We enter into this discussion today because West Virginia had some greatness taken from us on Wednesday night when Fred Schaus died at age 84.

The young among us may not understand the heights to which Fred Schaus rose as a basketball player, coach and administrator, it having been in what is the Golden Age of West Virginia basketball but the Dark Ages to those who are too young to have experienced it.

He was the man who brought Jerry West to West Virginia, the man who coached him and the Mountaineers to the doorstep of an NCAA championship, the man who went on to coach him with the Los Angeles Lakers, along with the likes of Hall of Famer Elgin Baylor.

He did that after having been an all-state high school player, a sailor in World War II, a 1,000-point scorer and third team All-American at WVU along with class president of the WVU student body as a junior.

And when he left WVU he became an NBA player in the era of the two-handed set shot, becoming a player in the first NBA All-Star Game before coming to back WVU to coach.

His journeys carried him to Purdue as a coach and then back to WVU, where he was a no-nonsense administrator, an athletic director who would sit his basketball coach, Gale Catlett, down and tell him who he was playing and not allow it to be the other way around.

Jay Jacobs, who is the color commentator on WVU basketball broadcasts today, was a member of Schaus’s greatest team and the source of a wealth of insight into the man and his persona. He wasn’t a star on the Jerry West teams, claiming Schaus had him sitting at the end of the bench “to block the cold winds from blowing in on Jerry and Willie Akers to make sure they didn’t get sick.”

As such, though, he could observe the man and his methods.

“I was scared to death of him,” he admits frankly.

Schaus was a large man, one who was demanding as a coach, as demanding of West as he was of his teammates, although as Jacobs would point out, there were some differences.

“If I was late for the bus, it would leave. If Jerry was late, they’d wait,” Jacobs said.

But, at least, West would hear about it.

“When he was mad he would be very aggressive vocally,” Jacobs said. “He would let you know he was mad and you knew you better straighten up.”

Jacobs recalls the day that Bobby Joe Smith made a bad play in practice.

“Fred got all over him,” Jacobs reported. “Bobby Joe just kicked the ball way up in the field house and Fred ran him out of there.”

Hundley’s antics had started before Schaus arrived and they were so ingrained as part of his schtick that Schaus would not change them, if he could, although Jacobs believed the hook shots from the corner and the football simulations drove Schaus insane.

“He was a stomper,” Jacobs recalled. “He was left-handed and when he was upset that left foot would hit the floor of the field house.”

Hundley almost had him wear out a pair of shoes a week.

Schaus knew his game, knew how to recruit and put together a team that found its way into the NCAA final against California, a final they lost by a point, leading Schaus to tell the team, “If we had five more seconds we’d be national champions.”

He might have had another chance as his team was winning a then-NCAA record 44 regular season games, a streak that would stretch overall to 56 straight while claiming six consecutive Southern Conference championships, but there was a Southern Conference final against William & Mary when he left his regulars in late into a game that had been put away, the result being a broken leg for one of his starters.

With him out the Mountaineers were stunned by Manhattan in the first round of the NCAA championships, 89-84, as West was held to 10 points.

“Fred was a humble, spirited competitor and his passion for winning and excellence were qualities about him that I admired,” West said. “We shared many incredible experiences, both joyous and painful, during our years together at WVU and then as my coach with the Los Angeles Lakers.”

Schaus was responsible for four Western Conference titles as head coach of the Lakers, and helped construct one of the best teams in NBA history in 1972 with West, Wilt Chamberlain, Gail Goodrich, Jim McMillian, Pat Riley and Happy Hairston that won an NBA record 33 straight games and captured the first NBA title in franchise history.

In many ways, Schaus was similar to current coach Bob Huggins, according to Jacobs, both in pressure defense and in their demeanor, although Schaus seldom used X-rated words. But Huggins certainly possesses great respect for the man.

“I think when Fred coached here they were in the polls for 40-some consecutive weeks and they were one of the premier teams in college basketball,” Huggins said. “I don’t know that there are a lot of people that can do the things Fred was able to do in his career.”

Former football coach Don Nehlen, a member of the College Football Hall of Fame, had been at WVU one year when Schaus returned from Purdue.

“The thing Fred did, I thought, was give our athletic program instant credibility,” Nehlen said. “He was such a nationally known figure and he was just an outstanding guy to work for and be around.”

E-mail Bob Hertzel at bhertzel@hotmail.com.