Robert Corriea
The Providence Journal
June 6, 1987

SOUTH KINGSTOWN --- A year after the sports world was shocked by the cocaine-induced deaths of two of its most promising athletes, drugs are still a serious problem in sports and society, a drug consultant to the National Football League said yesterday.

"I was encouraged last year because I thought we learned a lot by the deaths of Len Bias and Don Rogers. But since then, we have unlearned a lot," he said. "We have a real problem in this country."

Bias, an All-America basketball player at the University of Maryland, died June 19, 1986, two days after the Boston Celtics made him the second player chosen in the National Basketball Association draft.

Rogers, an All-Pro defensive back for the Cleveland Browns, died eight days later.

Hill was at the University of Rhode Island as part of a conference on "Drug Abuse in Sports," sponsored by the Institute for International Sport.

Also attending was Charles "Lefty" Driesell, the Maryland coach who resigned last October in the aftermath of Bias's death. He is an assistant athletic director at the university.

"I didn't get through to Leonard, for some reason. But we should all try to do something to get through to kids about drugs," Driesell told 100 high school and college coaches, trainers and educators.

"Len Bias was the greatest athlete I ever coached," said Driesell. "I just couldn't believe it when I saw him lying dead in the hospital."

Driesell said afterward that the conference represented the first time he has talked at length publicly about Bias's death and the use of drugs in sports.

"I personally think some athletes use cocaine to enhance their performance. That's why I'm for drug testing," Driesell said.

Driesell was invited to speak at the conference by Daniel Doyle, director of the Institute for International Sports, founded at URI eight months ago.

Driesell emphasized the need for player education and mandatory drug testing, although he acknowledged that both failed with Bias.

Hill said the problem with cocaine is twofold. The exhilaration it creates is addictive, and the money to be made from selling it is staggering.

Hill said the drug thrives in sports because of the insecurity that comes from brief careers and because athletes have a lot of money.

"Hard education has to be the key. We have to be relentless in getting the message out," he said. "Once people understand what the consequences are of using drugs, some people will still use them - Don Rogers is the classic case - but the majority will not."