SALT LAKE CITY (AP) _ Utah coach Rick Majerus said Tuesday he was leaving his team for the rest of the season to be with his cancer-stricken mother and recover from his own health problems.
The announcement came one week after Majerus, 52, underwent a coronary angiography and had stents inserted to clear two blocked arteries at LDS Hospital.
Majerus is planning to return to coaching for the 2001-02 season. But for now, he said during a teary news conference, he plans to be at his mother's side in Milwaukee. His mother has been diagnosed with a malignant tumor in her right lung.
"My mother isn't doing so well," Majerus said, choking up. "We're a very small family. My father is deceased. I am an only son. I have the time and the financial resources to be as supportive as I need to be."
Majerus checked out on Sunday from LDS Hospital after being hospitalized one week.
Majerus has a history of heart problems. He missed all but the first six games of the 1989-90 season, his first at Utah, after undergoing septuple-bypass surgery.
The Utes have seen their national prominence rise since Majerus arrived before the 1989-90 seasons, highlighted by a loss to Kentucky in the 1998 NCAA title game.
He left this year's team in mid-November, after coaching in a season-opening victory over Idaho State, to devote himself to rehabilitating his right knee.
Majerus had arthroscopic surgery on the knee in September but didn't heed doctor's orders to take a break from basketball. He immediately hit the recruiting trail and took his usual active role on the practice floor and the knee didn't heal properly.
He spent the next six weeks with a special trainer in Las Vegas and planned to rejoin the team during the first week of the year. But on New Year's Day, he complained of chest pains and was hospitalized.
In his absence, the Utes have been coached by assistant Dick Hunsaker, who will continue in that capacity. Utah is 9-6 after opening Mountain West Conference play with an 83-71 victory over Wyoming on Monday night.
"It's in the best interest of the team for the coach not to be in contact with the team while he's away," said Utah athletic director Chris Hill. "Coach Hunsaker will be in charge of the show."
Without Majerus, Utah had a mercurial pre-conference schedule. The Utes beat Memphis, Washington State and Pepperdine but lost to Southern California, Utah State, Weber State and Southern Utah.
Weber State's victory at the Huntsman Center on Dec. 9 snapped Utah's 54-game homecourt winning streak, which had been the nation's longest. Southern Utah's victory on Dec. 22 was its first ever in Salt Lake City.
The Utes have struggled to combine a talented lineup that featured several heralded newcomers but lacked a take-charge leader on the court.
This was only the second time in 11 seasons under Majerus that Utah didn't have a returning all-conference player.
It's been a frustrating start for Utah, which under Majerus has climbed to national prominence. The Utes were the eighth-winningest team in the 1990s and ranked eighth in winning percentage, trailing the likes of Kansas, Kentucky, North Carolina, Arizona and Connecticut.
Utah has made eight straight trips to the NCAA tournament under Majerus, who has never lost a first-round NCAA game during his time with the Utes.
Majerus has made a name for himself not only with his success on the court but his self-deprecating sense of humor, which often made fun of his large size and matching appetite.
But questions have circulated in recent years about his lifestyle. He's divorced and lives in a hotel near campus, a self-described workaholic who controls even the tiniest aspects of his program.
Dr. Kent Jones said Majerus has only one risk factor for heart disease: his weight.
"He's got to work on his weight. He's a person who is committed to that, now," Jones said.
Majerus made a point of saying that he has heart muscles of a 17-year-old, and Jones backed him up. Majerus had been swimming a mile a day and plans to return to exercise. Before his knee injury, he was running four miles a day, and after the knee injury, he was swimming one mile daily.
Majerus said he was shocked by attention his health has generated in the news media. He pointed that Vice President-elect Dick Cheney, who also has heart problems, is "a heartbeat away from being the most important man in the world. I don't think his heart was this scrutinized."
(Copyright 2001 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
