SENDAI, Japan, 19 August 2006 — Lebanon’s American-born coach Paul Coughter has taken a lot of trips in his life but none like the journey he and his players endured to get to the world championships in Japan.
Shortly after hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah broke out in Lebanon, Coughter and his players escaped from the mountains outside of Beirut, embarking on an exhausting journey that took them over the northern Lebanese boarder, into Syria and southwards to Jordan, where they restarted their training camp in Amman.
“We had practiced five days when the war started,” Coughter said yesterday in Japan. “We saw a window of opportunity to get out and took the last vehicle out of Lebanon and drove 12 hours to Jordan.
We practiced five days in Amman, went to Turkey, Slovenia, and the Philippines before arriving here.” During the trip out of Lebanon, Coughter and his players encountered places that had been bombed just hours earlier.
“We just tried to block everything out,” said Coughter.
“We had hardly anything to eat and were just trying to convince ourselves we would make it.” Coughter, who has coached on six continents over a career that spans 27 years, said he can’t even begin to imagine the stress the war put on his players.
“I’m an American who lives and works in Lebanon,” said Coughter. “I can’t presume to know what the player is feeling with his wife, child or parents back in Lebanon.
All I can try to offer my players is basketball as a positive distraction during this difficult time.”
Because of the problems back home, the team wasn’t able to bring along some key members including the manager, the physical and conditioning coach and one of its best players, US-born center Paul Khoury, who is stranded in Idaho with visa problems.
Lebanon finished last at the 2002 world championships and is hoping for better results here, but Coughter said he is realistic about the team’s chances.
“Every coach wants his team to advance to the second round,” said Coughter. “But I’m a realist. If we lose our first game we’ll lose all five. If we beat Venezuela in our first game we have a chance to make it out of the first round.” The top four teams in each group advance to the second round. Coughter said his team is hoping for wins over Venezuela and Nigeria.
The Lebanese are led by one of the Middle East’s best players, forward Fadi El Khatib. Two years ago, El Khatib unsuccessfully tried to get a release from his club team so he could play with the NBA’s Los Angeles Clippers.
Despite a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah, the Lebanese players say the conflict has motivated them to play for their country.
“The war gave us a great push to represent our country,” said El Khatib. “We want to show the world the Lebanese people are still there and we’ll always fight for our country.” Coughter was coaching in Taiwan in 1999 when he got an offer to hold a coaching clinic in Lebanon. Shortly after he arrived in Lebanon, he got a coaching offer and decided to stay when the league in Taiwan went under.
“I could see there was an appetite for basketball in Lebanon and this was another opportunity to travel.” Coughter was born into a large Irish Catholic family in New York. He learned basketball from his father, who played in high school, and his older brother, who was a university player.
The 57-year-old said basketball has helped him stay young.
“Never grow up, never work, never get married, those are the secrets to staying young,” said Coughter. After the worlds, the globe-trotting Coughter will take Lebanon’s junior team to the Asian championships in Urumqi, China, near the western Mongolian border.
