Bernard Toone RIP

[real chili 83]

Yesterday. Cancer

Surprised not posted here or MJS yet.

[MU82]

Sad to hear this.

He and Sam Worthen were Marquette’s stars my freshman year.

[Herman Cain]

Yesterday. Cancer

Surprised not posted here or MJS yet.

https://m.facebook.com/AlMcGuiresWarriors/posts/pfbid02Q5tjmemJrCh796QTBsi8gvZB2iMneDCmgnGYC15xLEY6cDzKZVvthkyhU7ferZX4l

[rocket surgeon]

i loved watching him play-RIP big guy

[MattyWarrior]

Wow,sad to hear that
 

[oldwarrior81]

I remember being in Bob Weingarts claass.  Maybe Injury Prevention.
A few of the hoops players were as well.

One day Artie Green and Sam Worthern were no shows.  Buff asks Bernard where his brothers were.
Bernard says "My brothers?  My brother is in New York.  I don't know where these clowns are"

[Daniel]

Very sad to hear….

[dgies9156]

BT was one of a kind. Saw most of the games he played at home at MU and he was quite an athlete when he was on. At his best, he was something to watch.

Rest in Peace BT. We'll miss you.

[Mutaman]

RIP

Was once in a store on Broadway wearing my Marquette tshirt and a guy came up to me and said he had just dropped Bernard off at Kennedy-he was flying to Europe to play ball.

[MuggsyB]

Terribly sorry to hear this news. May he rest in peace and condolences to his family.

[Uncle Rico]

A true Warrior

[Jockey]

Was always one of my favorite Warriors.

He and Al can continue their fight in the great beyond. My money is still on Al.

[Herman Cain]

Bernard "Looney " Toone was one of my favorite MU players. A lot of drama but also a ton of talent. Glad he was finally able to put it all together his Senior Season. 

 

[Spaniel with a Short Tail]

Sad news. My favorite player ever since I saw him in Dr. Lee Physics course. This came from some FB post.

*********

Sad news in MU nation. Warrior legend Bernard Toone passed away yesterday, July 9th, from cancer at the age of 65 in his hometown of Yonkers, New York.

As a high school senior, Toone was the 3rd ranked recruit in the United States, averaging 32 points and 20 rebounds per game for Gorton High School while being named MVP for the entire State of New York.

As a freshman on Al's '75-'76 Warriors, arguably Al's most talented Marquette team from top to bottom, Toone was one of six current or future All-Americans that included Earl Tatum, Lloyd Walton, Butch Lee, Bo Ellis and Jerome Whitehead.

From the start of his time at Marquette, however, Toone's relationship with Al was a complicated one and the two clashed often.

"Toone, a freshman in every way, smiles, chews gum, argues with McGuire, collects fouls and plays bad defense," wrote Sports Illustrated's Larry Keith. "McGuire can be a forgiving man, except when he thinks ability is being squandered. 'God doesn't give you talent so you can sit on it,' he says. For this reason McGuire feels God demands that he run Toone a mile before every practice. 'You've got to understand that Al was an overachiever as a player, and he can't stand to see Bernard waste all that ability,' says assistant coach Rick Majerus."

The promising 6'9" Toone averaged 5.5 points and 3.1 rebounds per game while coming off the bench to shoot a robust 57% from the field and 85% from the line as Al's '75-'76 Warriors went 27-2, finishing the year ranked 2nd behind only Bobby Knight's undefeated Indiana Hoosiers (32-0).

In his rocky sophomore season of '76-'77, Toone grew increasingly unhappy over his lack of playing time as he again came off the bench for Al, and saw his numbers dip to 4.4 points and 2.2 rebounds per game.

Toone's shooting percentages also dwindled as he hit just 41% from the field and 71% from the line, and he soon became known as much for his spats with Al over playing time as he was for his prowess on the court.

The root of the problem was Al's long-established 'star system', which gave preference to seniors, not sophomores.

"Hey, we've gone to tournaments now 11 years in a row," Al reasoned. "So the ballplayers usually have to wait their turns. It's a pecking order kind of thing. People don't understand our star system here, but we got to take care of our seniors. They're the stars."

Al was admittedly tough on the talented Toone, even famously bringing him to tears on the bench after publicly berating him so loudly during a home game at the MECCA Arena that fans wrote the local paper to complain about Al's treatment of the talented sophomore.

"I don't get involved with a player with limited talent," explained Al. "Hey, you never see me yelling at Bill Neary or Craig Butrym. But with Bernard, I've got to yell, bring it out of him. When a guy has the God-given ability that Bernard has, it would be a mortal sin for a coach not to get it out of him."

Eventually Toone appeared to acknowledge somewhat of a tacit truce with Al, saying, "I understand him now. That's just his way. He does it every year. When Butch Lee was a freshman, he always yelled at Butch. People talked about how maybe I was going to change schools because of him, but it never got to that."

"When I first got to Marquette,” confirmed Lee at the time, “he hollered at me so much that I wondered why he bothered to recruit me if he didn't like what I was doing so much. But then my roommate, Lloyd Walton, told me not to let it bother me, so I don't. But I guess I still don't understand him."

Al often cracked wise to reporters at Toone's expense, once remarking, "His attention span is, umm, about seven seconds. Now with the help of God, we're going to expand it. And hey, it's better than last year. Last year, it was three and a half seconds."

Then, leading up to the 1977 NCAA tournament, Al perhaps worked his legendary psychology on the young Toone, telling the assembled press, "He told me a few weeks ago, 'Hey, I'm a tournament player. I ought to be playing.' I told him, 'How the hell are we going to get to a tournament the way you're playing?'"

And much to the delight, if not surprise, of Al and the Warrior faithful, when the 1977 NCAA tournament rolled around, Toone proved he was indeed a 'tournament player', although he got off to a bumpy start in Marquette's 1st round game against Cincinnati, when the tension between Al and Toone finally boiled over in the Warrior locker room at halftime.

In the closing minutes of the first half, Toone had improvised a shot attempt on a set play, one of Al's pet peeves, which resulted in a hasty timeout by Al to pull Toone from the game.

As Toone walked past Al to take his place on the bench, Al snapped that he'd cut off Toone's hand if Toone ever tried another shot like that again.

Here's Toone's version of what happened next:

"This is the honest truth," confessed Toone years later. "During the timeout I said to Coach, 'You know something? You're a motherunnatural carnal knowledgeer to play for.'"

Minutes later, away from spectators, Al stormed into the Marquette locker room screaming, "Where is he? That son of a bitch! I'll kill him! I'll cut his throat!"

"He put his finger on my cheek and pushed my face, so I reacted like a New York kid," shrugged Toone. "I jumped up, grabbed him by the collar and flung him onto the taping table."

"I can't tell you what was actually said and how it went down," said Bo Ellis years later. “But Coach was a master psychologist.... I didn't think he was going to play Bernard anymore that game and Bernard ended up with like 26 points in the second half. He went to work and we won. And not until we got to the Championship game, before we went out on the floor, did Coach bring that situation up. He said, 'I never said anything about that on purpose. I did that to motivate you and I knew it would.' He thought we needed a jump-start and that's why he started the whole thing. And he never said anything to Bernard and never even mentioned that incident again until we got to the National Championship game."

Actually, contrary to Ellis' recollection, Toone only scored 4 points in 20 minutes of play against Cincinnati, but then had a solid game off the bench in Marquette's 67-66 win over Kansas State, notching 8 points on 2 of 4 shooting while going 4 for 5 from the line with 5 rebounds in just 19 minutes of play.

"That gave us a sense of purpose," explained Toone years later when talking about his halftime scuffle with Al. "After that, we settled down as a team. He left me alone, and we all just played."

But Al didn't quite leave Toone alone and, contrary to Ellis' recollection, it was just before the Regional Finals against Wake Forest when Al pulled Toone aside to clear the air.

"I don't take my ballplayers aside," Al explained before the National Championship game. "I don't talk. I dictate. But I wanted to talk to Bernard last week. I made an exception. Wake Forest maybe would have been my last game, so I wanted to talk to Bernard about the whole situation. I told him three things. I won't say what they are, but if he learns these three things he could become a combination Maurice Lucas and Dean Meminger. His world would be a merry-go-round."

After his discussion with Al, Toone played inspired basketball against the Demon Deacons, proving instrumental in the 82-68 win as he took over for Jerome Whitehead early in the second half due to foul trouble.

Toone finished with 18 points, going 6 for 11 from the field and 6 for 6 from the line in just 24 minutes of play to help propel Marquette to the Elite Eight.

"He's a tremendous athlete," marveled Wake Forest Coach Carl Tacy after the game. "The work he did inside was as good as I've seen a man his size do this season."

Of course, Al retired after the '77 Championship and, despite their well-publicized differences, Toone was less than pleased that Al was leaving after just his sophomore season.

"I was mad," Toone admitted later. "I expected to spend all my four years with him. I have pure respect for him. Him being who he was, me coming in as one of the most highly recruited players ever at Marquette, he had his philosophy. But he admitted to me it was a little outdated. He told me he couldn't rely just on his senior star system anymore."

As for Al, he finished his coaching career with nothing but praise for Toone.

"Bernard is a scorer. An unbelievable scorer. The next two years he may be the greatest offensive weapon on the team if they decide to pick up that style of play. Bernard has absolutely the finest personality of any kid I've ever had. And he's the purest shooter for a 6'9" guy of maybe any guy in the history of basketball. He's got the touch of a velvet burglar, a second-story man. It's frightening."

The next season, Toone averaged 9.3 points and 4.8 rebounds per game for Hank Raymonds' '77-'78 Warriors, shooting 51% from the field and 69% from the line.

Despite being the No. 1 team in the country as late as February 21, 1978, Marquette finished the season ranked 8th with a record of 24-4 after falling in the 1st round of the tournament to an unranked Miami of Ohio team, 84-81.

As a senior, Toone served as Raymonds' captain and earned All-American honors as he led the '78-'79 Warriors in both scoring at 18.7 points per game and rebounding at 6.7 per game while shooting 49% from the field and 84% from the line.

Toone led Marquette to a record of 22-7 that season and a final AP ranking of 10th after losing in the 2nd round to Mark Aguirre's DePaul Blue Demons, despite Toone's game-high 26 points in what was his final game as a Warrior.

Toone then left Marquette and entered the 1979 NBA draft, where he was chosen by the Philadelphia 76ers with the 15th pick of the 2nd round (37th overall).

Toone played in just 23 games for the 76ers during his rookie season, averaging 5.4 minutes, 2.4 points and 1.5 rebounds per contest as Philadelphia streaked to the 1980 NBA Finals behind the play of Julius Erving.

Toone played in four of the 76ers' post-season games that season for a total of just 6 minutes as Philadelphia lost the NBA Championship to former teammate Butch Lee and fellow Warrior great Jim Chones' Los Angeles Lakers.

After his lone NBA season, Toone played professionally for five years in Italy and Venezuela before leaving basketball for good.

Unfortunately, after retirement, Toone had multiple brushes with the law that involved charges of theft, unauthorized use of an auto, and grand theft larceny, then spent seven months in a drug rehabilitation facility due to a cocaine problem.

"I made a few mistakes," a humble Toone admitted to the Milwaukee Journal's Mary Schmitt in March of 1987.

One of Marquette's all-time greats, may Bernard Rest In Peace.

[MU82]

Thanks for posting that, Spaniel.

My takeaways:

++ According to Toone -- and in conflict with the legend -- Al never punched him; and Toone got the better of their physical encounter. "He put his finger on my cheek and pushed my face, so I reacted like a New York kid. I jumped up, grabbed him by the collar and flung him onto the taping table."

++ If the opportunity existed back then, Toone definitely would have entered the transfer portal after his freshman season. It's much more difficult to keep a team together now, and it's also more difficult for a coach to be a my-way-or-the-highway authoritarian. I'm not criticizing Al; that was then, his style was pretty much the norm, and it's usually best to judge coaches in the context of their own eras.

++ Despite Al's tough love and life lessons, Toone didn't really blossom as a player until Al had already been gone for nearly 2 years. Then, years later, Bernard had numerous brushes with the law. Coaches can have huge influence, but it's still up to the person to determine his or her own life events.

++ Bo Ellis doesn't have the greatest memory. He thought "Bernard ended up with like 26 points in the second half," when Toone actually had scored only 4.

++ Like almost every coach at every level of basketball -- the great coaches, the bad coaches, and the vast majority who reside between those extremes -- Al had a star system. With very few exceptions throughout history, stars have always gotten preferential treatment, usually significant preferential treatment, and that's OK as long as it leads to success.

I loved reading all that about MU's glory days, and learning a little more about Bernard Toone. RIP.

[Lennys Tap]

Sad news. My favorite player ever since I saw him in Dr. Lee Physics course. This came from some FB post.

*********

Sad news in MU nation. Warrior legend Bernard Toone passed away yesterday, July 9th, from cancer at the age of 65 in his hometown of Yonkers, New York.

As a high school senior, Toone was the 3rd ranked recruit in the United States, averaging 32 points and 20 rebounds per game for Gorton High School while being named MVP for the entire State of New York.

As a freshman on Al's '75-'76 Warriors, arguably Al's most talented Marquette team from top to bottom, Toone was one of six current or future All-Americans that included Earl Tatum, Lloyd Walton, Butch Lee, Bo Ellis and Jerome Whitehead.

From the start of his time at Marquette, however, Toone's relationship with Al was a complicated one and the two clashed often.

"Toone, a freshman in every way, smiles, chews gum, argues with McGuire, collects fouls and plays bad defense," wrote Sports Illustrated's Larry Keith. "McGuire can be a forgiving man, except when he thinks ability is being squandered. 'God doesn't give you talent so you can sit on it,' he says. For this reason McGuire feels God demands that he run Toone a mile before every practice. 'You've got to understand that Al was an overachiever as a player, and he can't stand to see Bernard waste all that ability,' says assistant coach Rick Majerus."

The promising 6'9" Toone averaged 5.5 points and 3.1 rebounds per game while coming off the bench to shoot a robust 57% from the field and 85% from the line as Al's '75-'76 Warriors went 27-2, finishing the year ranked 2nd behind only Bobby Knight's undefeated Indiana Hoosiers (32-0).

In his rocky sophomore season of '76-'77, Toone grew increasingly unhappy over his lack of playing time as he again came off the bench for Al, and saw his numbers dip to 4.4 points and 2.2 rebounds per game.

Toone's shooting percentages also dwindled as he hit just 41% from the field and 71% from the line, and he soon became known as much for his spats with Al over playing time as he was for his prowess on the court.

The root of the problem was Al's long-established 'star system', which gave preference to seniors, not sophomores.

"Hey, we've gone to tournaments now 11 years in a row," Al reasoned. "So the ballplayers usually have to wait their turns. It's a pecking order kind of thing. People don't understand our star system here, but we got to take care of our seniors. They're the stars."

Al was admittedly tough on the talented Toone, even famously bringing him to tears on the bench after publicly berating him so loudly during a home game at the MECCA Arena that fans wrote the local paper to complain about Al's treatment of the talented sophomore.

"I don't get involved with a player with limited talent," explained Al. "Hey, you never see me yelling at Bill Neary or Craig Butrym. But with Bernard, I've got to yell, bring it out of him. When a guy has the God-given ability that Bernard has, it would be a mortal sin for a coach not to get it out of him."

Eventually Toone appeared to acknowledge somewhat of a tacit truce with Al, saying, "I understand him now. That's just his way. He does it every year. When Butch Lee was a freshman, he always yelled at Butch. People talked about how maybe I was going to change schools because of him, but it never got to that."

"When I first got to Marquette,” confirmed Lee at the time, “he hollered at me so much that I wondered why he bothered to recruit me if he didn't like what I was doing so much. But then my roommate, Lloyd Walton, told me not to let it bother me, so I don't. But I guess I still don't understand him."

Al often cracked wise to reporters at Toone's expense, once remarking, "His attention span is, umm, about seven seconds. Now with the help of God, we're going to expand it. And hey, it's better than last year. Last year, it was three and a half seconds."

Then, leading up to the 1977 NCAA tournament, Al perhaps worked his legendary psychology on the young Toone, telling the assembled press, "He told me a few weeks ago, 'Hey, I'm a tournament player. I ought to be playing.' I told him, 'How the hell are we going to get to a tournament the way you're playing?'"

And much to the delight, if not surprise, of Al and the Warrior faithful, when the 1977 NCAA tournament rolled around, Toone proved he was indeed a 'tournament player', although he got off to a bumpy start in Marquette's 1st round game against Cincinnati, when the tension between Al and Toone finally boiled over in the Warrior locker room at halftime.

In the closing minutes of the first half, Toone had improvised a shot attempt on a set play, one of Al's pet peeves, which resulted in a hasty timeout by Al to pull Toone from the game.

As Toone walked past Al to take his place on the bench, Al snapped that he'd cut off Toone's hand if Toone ever tried another shot like that again.

Here's Toone's version of what happened next:

"This is the honest truth," confessed Toone years later. "During the timeout I said to Coach, 'You know something? You're a motherunnatural carnal knowledgeer to play for.'"

Minutes later, away from spectators, Al stormed into the Marquette locker room screaming, "Where is he? That son of a bitch! I'll kill him! I'll cut his throat!"

"He put his finger on my cheek and pushed my face, so I reacted like a New York kid," shrugged Toone. "I jumped up, grabbed him by the collar and flung him onto the taping table."

"I can't tell you what was actually said and how it went down," said Bo Ellis years later. “But Coach was a master psychologist.... I didn't think he was going to play Bernard anymore that game and Bernard ended up with like 26 points in the second half. He went to work and we won. And not until we got to the Championship game, before we went out on the floor, did Coach bring that situation up. He said, 'I never said anything about that on purpose. I did that to motivate you and I knew it would.' He thought we needed a jump-start and that's why he started the whole thing. And he never said anything to Bernard and never even mentioned that incident again until we got to the National Championship game."

Actually, contrary to Ellis' recollection, Toone only scored 4 points in 20 minutes of play against Cincinnati, but then had a solid game off the bench in Marquette's 67-66 win over Kansas State, notching 8 points on 2 of 4 shooting while going 4 for 5 from the line with 5 rebounds in just 19 minutes of play.

"That gave us a sense of purpose," explained Toone years later when talking about his halftime scuffle with Al. "After that, we settled down as a team. He left me alone, and we all just played."

But Al didn't quite leave Toone alone and, contrary to Ellis' recollection, it was just before the Regional Finals against Wake Forest when Al pulled Toone aside to clear the air.

"I don't take my ballplayers aside," Al explained before the National Championship game. "I don't talk. I dictate. But I wanted to talk to Bernard last week. I made an exception. Wake Forest maybe would have been my last game, so I wanted to talk to Bernard about the whole situation. I told him three things. I won't say what they are, but if he learns these three things he could become a combination Maurice Lucas and Dean Meminger. His world would be a merry-go-round."

After his discussion with Al, Toone played inspired basketball against the Demon Deacons, proving instrumental in the 82-68 win as he took over for Jerome Whitehead early in the second half due to foul trouble.

Toone finished with 18 points, going 6 for 11 from the field and 6 for 6 from the line in just 24 minutes of play to help propel Marquette to the Elite Eight.

"He's a tremendous athlete," marveled Wake Forest Coach Carl Tacy after the game. "The work he did inside was as good as I've seen a man his size do this season."

Of course, Al retired after the '77 Championship and, despite their well-publicized differences, Toone was less than pleased that Al was leaving after just his sophomore season.

"I was mad," Toone admitted later. "I expected to spend all my four years with him. I have pure respect for him. Him being who he was, me coming in as one of the most highly recruited players ever at Marquette, he had his philosophy. But he admitted to me it was a little outdated. He told me he couldn't rely just on his senior star system anymore."

As for Al, he finished his coaching career with nothing but praise for Toone.

"Bernard is a scorer. An unbelievable scorer. The next two years he may be the greatest offensive weapon on the team if they decide to pick up that style of play. Bernard has absolutely the finest personality of any kid I've ever had. And he's the purest shooter for a 6'9" guy of maybe any guy in the history of basketball. He's got the touch of a velvet burglar, a second-story man. It's frightening."

The next season, Toone averaged 9.3 points and 4.8 rebounds per game for Hank Raymonds' '77-'78 Warriors, shooting 51% from the field and 69% from the line.

Despite being the No. 1 team in the country as late as February 21, 1978, Marquette finished the season ranked 8th with a record of 24-4 after falling in the 1st round of the tournament to an unranked Miami of Ohio team, 84-81.

As a senior, Toone served as Raymonds' captain and earned All-American honors as he led the '78-'79 Warriors in both scoring at 18.7 points per game and rebounding at 6.7 per game while shooting 49% from the field and 84% from the line.

Toone led Marquette to a record of 22-7 that season and a final AP ranking of 10th after losing in the 2nd round to Mark Aguirre's DePaul Blue Demons, despite Toone's game-high 26 points in what was his final game as a Warrior.

Toone then left Marquette and entered the 1979 NBA draft, where he was chosen by the Philadelphia 76ers with the 15th pick of the 2nd round (37th overall).

Toone played in just 23 games for the 76ers during his rookie season, averaging 5.4 minutes, 2.4 points and 1.5 rebounds per contest as Philadelphia streaked to the 1980 NBA Finals behind the play of Julius Erving.

Toone played in four of the 76ers' post-season games that season for a total of just 6 minutes as Philadelphia lost the NBA Championship to former teammate Butch Lee and fellow Warrior great Jim Chones' Los Angeles Lakers.

After his lone NBA season, Toone played professionally for five years in Italy and Venezuela before leaving basketball for good.

Unfortunately, after retirement, Toone had multiple brushes with the law that involved charges of theft, unauthorized use of an auto, and grand theft larceny, then spent seven months in a drug rehabilitation facility due to a cocaine problem.

"I made a few mistakes," a humble Toone admitted to the Milwaukee Journal's Mary Schmitt in March of 1987.

One of Marquette's all-time greats, may Bernard Rest In Peace.

Great stuff, Spaniel.

Bernard was as talented as any player Al ever recruited, but he never 100% bought in -at MU or afterwards. What might have been.

RIP, Bernard.