MIAMI — When Dwyane Wade heard the plight of a South Florida woman whose nephew accidentally burned down her home — and ruined all the family’s possessions — the Miami Heat star knew he had to do something.

So he helped the family move into a new home, just in time for Christmas.

Wade presented Dawn Smith with the ultimate Christmas gift on Wednesday — the keys to a her new house, along with some furnishings, clothing and gifts to make sure her family has a joyous holiday, something that didn’t seem likely just a few weeks ago.

His Wade’s World foundation will make some payments on the home, while Smith and her family get back on their feet.

“That’s what I try to teach my kids,” said Wade, whose foundation has hosted several charity events this holiday season, mostly for needy children. “It’s not about what you’re going to receive — it’s what you can give to others from what you’ve received.”

Smith couldn’t hold back happy sobs when she saw the home for the first time.

“A big time relief,” Smith said, clearly overcome by emotion. “Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Oh, God, thank you so much.”

The NBA’s leading scorer this season had a simple message: “Hopefully, you’ll like it.”

Wade’s other holiday events this year included a party for 350 children on Monday, and hosting 100 kids at Tuesday night’s Heat game against the Golden State Warriors. He also donated $10,000 to each of three children’s organizations, but said he was particularly touched by his gift to the Smith family.

“We can help this family have a new beginning,” Wade said.

Portland, Ore-Brandon Roy (From Seattle) kept scoring until the Portland Trail Blazers had finally finished off the Phoenix Suns in a recent NBA game (Dec 19th).

Roy scored a career high 52 points, including a tiebreaking 3-pointer with 1:01 left, in Portland’s 124-119 comeback victory.

“I think this is by far the best offensive game I’ve had. I can’t say the basket was big, but my confidence was huge tonight. I just felt like every shot I took was going in,” Roy said.

Roy was 14-of-27 from the field and 19-of-21 at the line. He topped his career high of 38. He ended up two points short of the franchise record of 54 set by Damon Stoudamire against New Orleans on Jan 14, 2005.

PS Roy is from Seattle, Washington’s Garfield High School and went to college at the University of Washington. Big shout out to B-Roy from Sports Inner City. And we will keep you updated on other Seattle residence playing in the NBA like Nate Robinson, Jamal Crawford, Spencer Hawes, Jason “The Jet” Terry, Aaron Brooks and more. G.C

Charles Barkley is angered by Auburn’s hiring of Gene Chizik, telling ESPN.com that his alma mater didn’t hire Turner Gill (pic above) because the Buffalo coach is African American.

“I think race was the #1 factor. You can say it’s not about race, but you can’t compare the two resumes and say (Chizik) deserved the job. Out of all the coaches they interviewed, Chizik probably had the worst resume.”

Barkley added, “I just thought Turner Gill would be the perfect choice for two reasons. He’s a terrific coach and we needed to make a splash. I thought we had to do something spectacular to bring attention to the program. Clearly, if we’d hired a African American coach, it would have created a buzz.”

Barkley played basketball for the Tigers for three years in the early 1980s before embarking on a Hall Of Fame career in the NBA. He currently is an NBA analyst for TNT.

Tommy Tuberville was forced to resign as Auburn’s football coach this month after going 85-40 in 10 seasons. He was replaced by Chizik, who served as defensive coordinator at Auburn and Texas before taking the head-coaching job at Iowa State, where he went 5-19 in two seasons.

Gill, a former Nebraska QB, took his team to the MAC title this season. He is one of four African American head coaches in Division 1-A out of 119 schools.

The University of Washington recently named their new head coach of the football program and his name is Steve Sarkisian.

 Willingham had to go. Having said that, we all know that Ty Willingham was a African American. One of a few African American head coaches in big time college football. So here is the question readers. Does that mean the next Husky head coach had to be white?

In my opinion, the University of Washington moved to quickly in it’s pick of Steve Sarkisian. The USC’s offensive coordinator.

Sarkisian becomes the third youngest coach in college football.

Guys with much more experience (black and white) were passed over or did not get a interview. For instance Turner Gill. Who turned the Buffalo program around and is going to a bowl game this year. Sarkisian did not start coaching until 2001 and has only been a coordinator for two seasons. When Washington interviewed him, it was his first interview for a head coaching position!!

Bob Keisser of the Long Beach Press-Telegram recently wrote a article that was not kind to Sarkisian at all. I saw the article in the Seattle PI newspaper.

Some of the things he said in the article is between 2002 and 2005, USC averaged 41 points a game, since then, scoring is off more than a full touchdown. He went to say the loss of Matt Leinart and Reggie Bush had a impact, but the team has lost it’s “juice” and players aren’t as well prepared. I heard the same about players under Willingham here in Seattle.

USC scored 27 points or fewer seven times in 2007 and was taken to the wire by Arizona and Cal this season Keisser wrote. He said those games are hardly resume highlights.

He went on to say Sarkisian may be less prepared than other offensive coordinators in college football because he rarely had final say on play calling. He also never worked from the press box like most coordinators.

Keisser also wrote that their are many more inventive offenses in the nation than USC’s. And that USC no longer have much of a deep passing game, and that the passing game to tight ends and backs left with Coach Chow and that USC has been shuffling running backs in and out at the cost of team harmony. THIS is damaging information in my opinion.

The Long Beach writer also said that the Coach Carroll coaching tree has produced coaches that have not done well. Like Nick Holt who left to become the head coach at Idaho in 2004 and went 5-18 in two seasons. Ed Orgeron was named head coach at Mississippi in 2005 and went 10-25 in three seasons, with a 3-21 record in SEC games.

The article said that Lane Kiffin got his first coaching job in 2001 at USC. He was for some unknown reason named head coach of the Oakland Raiders for 2007 and went 4-12 in his first season. He was fired after a 1-3 start this year. Also for some unknown reason, Kiffin was named head coach at Tennessee.

The article went on to say that UCLA defensive coach Dwayne Walker has much more experience than the new UW coach and that the UCLA defense was the only good thing about Bruins football. Walker has nine years of college experience and seven years of NFL experience.

The article ended with Kiesser saying “Experience apparently doesn’t mean much anymore, whether it’s the coaching resume or past imports from California.”

So in ending, why was the media here in Seattle so happy about Sarkisian being hired? In the rush to replace Willingham, the UW did not look at the experience of a Walker or Gill.

Yes Washington opened up it’s doors to have African Americans running there ladies basketball, men’s basketball and football programs.

But like I said earlier, does that mean the next head coach had to be a white fella with experience that is MUCH LESS than others who happen to be African American?

Remember readers, there are only THREE AFRICAN AMERICAN HEAD COACHES OUT OF 119 SCHOOLS!! And MORE THAN 50% OF THE PLAYERS ON THE FIELD ARE AFRICAN AMERICAN.

Hopefully Floyd Kieth of the BCA will speak out more on this problem and even President elect Obama who is a big sports fan will look into this problem also when he is president.       Gordon Curvey

Tyrone Willinghma was fired after three years at Notre Dame with a winning percentage only slightly better than what his successor, Charlie Weis, has achieved in four seasons.

So, his reaction to ND’s decision to keep Weis for a fifth year? “Maybe Notre Dame got it right,” he said, according to the Chicago Tribune.

“It’s not just my issue, it’s a college football issue, we have to give coaches a chance to do their job. Because now we have coaches especially some minority coaches, they are losing their jobs after 21/2 years. That’s not right.”

Willingham was fired at ND with a record of 21-15 (a winning % of .583) and two bowl appearances. Weis is 28-21 (.571) with two bowl appearances in four seasons. But with 15 of his 21 losses coming in the past two seasons.

Although some have pointed to Weis’ record as evidence that Willingham has hurt by a double standard. Willingham has been reluctant to inject himself into that debate.

“For me, the experience was a steppingstone, hopefully not a steppingstone personally but a steppingstone for African Americans,” Willingham said. “The sad thing is the way all of it happened. There was that somewhat ghosted image that we were not successful. That’s not the truth. Of the three years there, two of those were bowl teams.”

Willingham was fired this season at Washington where the Huskies are 0-11 entering the season finale at Cal. With his firing, the resignation of Sylvester Croom at Mississippi State and the firing of Ron Prince at Kansas State, only three African American coaches in college football’s 119 team top tier remain. Randy Shannon at Miami, Turner Gill at Buffalo and Kevin Sumlin at Houston.

Willingham said African American coaches have proved they can succeed but noted the job opportunities they have been afforded are among the most difficult situations in big time college. Willingham took over a Washington Husky team that went 1-10 in 2004. At Mississippi State, Croom faced an uphill battle in the ultra competitive SEC. And Gill Gill has turned around a Buffalo program that was among the nation’s worst.

“It has always been the downtrodden that we’ve had to take over. There are a lot of things not right with those situations. The degree of difficulty is enhanced in those programs. You do the best you can with the resources around you.”

“Maybe Notre Dame got it right (regarding Weis), but we have to change that mentality with African American coaches. Nick Saban is making it work at Alabama in his second season. But in the majority of cases, it’s going to take longer to get things right and up to speed.”